{"id":179352,"date":"2025-07-18T14:55:22","date_gmt":"2025-07-18T14:55:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/179352\/"},"modified":"2025-07-18T14:55:22","modified_gmt":"2025-07-18T14:55:22","slug":"james-harden-was-reportedly-the-key-voice-in-recruiting-bradley-beal-to-clippers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/179352\/","title":{"rendered":"James Harden was reportedly ‘the key voice’ in recruiting Bradley Beal to Clippers"},"content":{"rendered":"

It wasn\u2019t too hard to connect the dots. The Phoenix Suns, having just seen the Milwaukee Bucks boldly explore new horizons in Willingness to Eat Dead Money<\/a>, were suddenly considering using the stretch provision<\/a> in the NBA\/NBPA collective bargaining agreement to bring an end to the execrable Bradley Beal experiment. The Los Angeles Clippers, having just traded Norman Powell<\/a> in a three-team deal to bring in power forward John Collins, were suddenly in need of a new shooting guard.<\/p>\n

As clean as the transition from Arizona to California seemed from the outside, though, Beal reportedly had interest from a number of suitors<\/a> interested in buying low on a three-time All-Star who might not have lived up to his old contract, but had a chance to be a steal on a dramatically smaller one<\/a>. Securing Beal\u2019s services, then, would require an assist. Luckily, the Clippers already employ a guy who specializes in those.<\/p>\n

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With Beal nearing a buyout agreement<\/a> that would allow him to reach the unrestricted market, All-NBA point man James Harden became \u201cthe key voice\u201d in the Clippers\u2019 pursuit of the soon-to-be-former Suns guard, according to ESPN\u2019s Brian Windhorst<\/a>, working both L.A.\u2019s front office and Beal himself to play matchmaker and consummate the deal:<\/p>\n

Harden sold Beal on the Clippers’ depth and talked about how he would work well with Powell, who had a career-best season playing alongside Harden after replacing Paul George in the starting lineup last season.<\/p>\n

He outlined how the Clippers had embraced and helped him pivot in his career after disappointing runs in Brooklyn and Philadelphia damaged his reputation. Beal, coming off a disappointing run in Phoenix that had similarly stunted his value across the league, could relate.<\/p>\n

Harden even took the unusual step of speaking with [Beal\u2019s agent] Mark Bartelstein after all parties, including Harden’s agents, approved the conversation. Recruiting a star peer is commonplace in the NBA; recruiting another agent to get on board is not.<\/p>\n

“No one wants to be released. There’s heartache with that,” Mark Bartelstein said. “But Bradley wants to be in a position where no one remembers he got released, that they’ll remember how he plays next season.”<\/p>\n

If Beal can play something like Powell played last season, when the former Raptors and Trail Blazers swingman put up career-best scoring numbers while shouldering a heavier shot-creation workload than ever before, then they just might. If he can, then Harden \u2014 who dished 114 dimes to Powell last season<\/a>, the 19th-most-frequent assist combination in the NBA, according to PBP Stats<\/a> \u2014 could be well on his way toward a fifth straight top-five finish in assists per game at the controls of an L.A. offense that scored at a top-10 clip<\/a> after Kawhi Leonard made his season debut in early January. (It\u2019s also worth noting that, while Beal has played alongside superstars like Russell Westbrook, Devin Booker and Kevin Durant over the past several seasons, Harden is by far the best pure playmaker he\u2019ll have shared the court with since peak pre-injury John Wall \u2026 and that, when Beal was regularly seeing that kind of service, he looked like a bona fide future superstar.)<\/p>\n

If that happens, then a Clippers team that won 50 games and pushed the Nuggets the distance in the opening round of the 2025 postseason could prove an even tougher out next spring \u2026 and Beal, who will hold a player option for the 2026-27 season, will put himself in position to re-enter the market in search of a much more lucrative payday this time next summer.<\/p>\n

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If you\u2019re thinking that looks like a lot of ifs \u2026 well, you\u2019re not alone. Such is life when you\u2019re talking about former superstars with injury histories on the wrong side of 30 hoping for a fresh start after a $45 million reduction in salary. The game\u2019s not played on paper; the Clippers will need to connect the dots for themselves on the court. Beal\u2019s arrival gives them another opportunity to add to the bigger picture, though \u2014 and for that, it seems, they have their bearded table-setter to thank.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"It wasn\u2019t too hard to connect the dots. The Phoenix Suns, having just seen the Milwaukee Bucks boldly…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":179353,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3789],"tags":[7,3086,670,559,10351,2292,560,6971,1916,529,938,4034,192,4032,251,135,4033,4031,121,6,558,302,526,678,472,681,254,1617],"class_list":{"0":"post-179352","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-los-angeles-clippers","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-bradley-beal","10":"tag-brooklyn","11":"tag-clippers","12":"tag-collective-bargaining-agreement","13":"tag-devin-booker","14":"tag-james-harden","15":"tag-john-collins","16":"tag-john-wall","17":"tag-kawhi-leonard","18":"tag-kevin-durant","19":"tag-la","20":"tag-la-clippers","21":"tag-laclippers","22":"tag-los-angeles","23":"tag-los-angeles-clippers","24":"tag-losangeles","25":"tag-losangelesclippers","26":"tag-milwaukee-bucks","27":"tag-nba","28":"tag-norman-powell","29":"tag-nuggets","30":"tag-paul-george","31":"tag-philadelphia","32":"tag-phoenix-suns","33":"tag-raptors","34":"tag-russell-westbrook","35":"tag-trail-blazers"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/114874818490819555","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/179352","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=179352"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/179352\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/179353"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=179352"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=179352"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=179352"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}