ESPN insider Adrian Wojnarowski cited a pair of recent cases involving James Harden and the Houston Rockets as examples of what the NBA is attempting to prevent with its announcement of stiffer penalties for tampering with players under contract.
This exchange occurred during Wojnarowski’s conversation with fellow ESPN reporter Brian Windhorst on The Woj Pod:
“I can’t control if players talk to Giannis and say ‘hey, come play with me,'” Windhorst said of a hypothetical current example with the Milwaukee Bucks and Giannis Antetokounmpo. “What I don’t want is a player acting as a proxy of a team. To me, that’s where I think there could be targeting. And, it’s also a fair complaint by the teams who are afraid of getting their guys (poached).”
“That’s 100 percent where the league plans to target on this,” Wojnarowski said. “They understand they’re not targeting two players out at dinner. Or two players texting about wanting to play together. What the league says they want to do, what’s been communicated to the owners, the teams is when a player is acting on behalf of his organization, when the owner or the GM puts the player up to, ‘Hey, that guy is under contract in small market A, start working that guy to ask for a trade demand. You start working that guy, let him know we’re going to offer A, B, C and D to his team to get him out of here to bring him here.’
That’s what they’re after. When that’s orchestrated. I think the player to player… certainly with the (James) Harden, Chris Paul to Houston. And then Harden to (Russell) Westbrook to move Chris Paul out of Houston.
After the Rockets traded for Paul on June 28, 2017, the Los Angeles Times cited one anonymous NBA executive who said that Harden had been recruiting Paul throughout the prior season, when he was playing for the Los Angeles Clippers.
Just over two years later, in Westbrook’s July 2019 introductory press conference in Houston, the former Oklahoma City Thunder star said Harden had a “huge role” in the trade.
Heading into this season, Westbrook, Clint Capela, and Eric Gordon — all leading members of Harden’s current supporting cast — are each under contract with the Rockets for at least the next three seasons.
Given that established core, Houston seems unlikely to be a major player in star “recruitments” for the immediate future. In turn, that should help the Rockets avoid any of the stricter penalties that the league appears ready to issue moving forward.
