Getty Chris Paul and James Harden
It didn’t take long for Chris Paul to respond to the bombshell Yahoo Sports report that he has requested a trade out of Houston and that his relationship with fellow star James Harden was “unsalvageable.”
On a Bleacher Report post showing a story blurb summarizing the report, Paul responded with a shrug emoticon and said, “Damn! News to me…”
Chris Paul appears to be denying the report that he wants out of Houston.
According to a report from Yahoo Sports Vincent Goodwill, the relationship between James Harden and Paul has been called “unsalvageable” and the star players no longer want to play for the same franchise.
The report goes on to say that Paul demanded a trade following the team’s playoff exit to the Golden State Warriors in the second round and that Harden gave the team an ultimatum: him or me.
It also lists Paul’s injury issues as a reason for Harden growing “annoyed” with the nine-time NBA All-Star.
GettyHouston Rockets guards Chris Paul and James Harden.
Morey Says Tension Among Rockets’ Stars Good
ESPN’s Tim MacMahon reported earlier in the week that there was turmoil within the organization, notably between Harden and Paul.
Daryl Morey appeared to respond to that report Monday on ESPN’s “Golic and Wingo” radio show.
He said Paul did not request a trade and the tensions between the “first-ballot Hall of Famers” was a good thing.
“We have two high-level competitors, Chris and James, who their only goal in life at this point is to win the title. They’ve accomplished everything else, they are both going to be first-ballot Hall of Famers. Two competitive superstars at that level, there’s going to be times when they are extremely competitive, extremely focused on how do we get to that next level, and when we don’t there’s going to be frustration,” Morey told ESPN. “I’m frustrated, our top players are frustrated, [coach] Mike D’Antoni is frustrated. We want to take the last step and be the champion and I think it’s good that there is tension in the sense that we all want to win.”
Earlier this month, it was reported by ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski that Morey was making everyone available for trade to reshape the roster to compete for a title, which seemed to include Chris Paul.
Morey has maintained the team will be firm on getting better this offseason to “be the favorite” in the west — even with Anthony Davis now on the Los Angeles Lakers.
“We feel like we should be the favorite in the West, and we’re going to do moves to show people that we should be the favorite in the West, and that’s going to create a little tension when we do that. But at the end of the day, we’re going to have at least our starting five back, which again most teams are scrambling to keep it together and we’re going to spend midlevel, we’re going to spend into the tax. We’re going to be one of the most expensive rosters like we were last year and this year and we’re going to be right there,” he said.
Paul, 34, has three years and $124 million left on his contract, which will make finding a trading partner extremely hard, especially at Paul’s age with a sharp decline in production.
Paul scored just 15.6 points last season and his 3.11 assist-to-turnover ratio ranked 40th in the NBA. He shot a career-low 41.9 percent from the field.