The uniform looked the same. The beard looked the same. The number, the name, the shoes — all of it suggested that the man with the ball in his hands was the same James Harden we saw here last season. But this was some different dude. And if he sticks around, the Sixers are a radically different team.
That’s what you saw on Saturday afternoon. The strength in the legs. The stability in the core. The hesitation. The elevation. This wasn’t the guy the Sixers acquired last season. This was the guy they thought they were acquiring. It took a bit longer than expected, but the Sixers’ 121-101 win over the Nets in their playoff opener sure felt like it was the start of a materialization of a plan.
That’s how good Harden looked. He has talked all season about how much better his body feels compared to a frustrating and borderline lost 2021-22 season in which poor conditioning and a lingering hamstring injury left him a stumbling, fumbling, flat-footed shell of himself. On Saturday, those words were unnecessary. You could see it.
