James Harden officially went through his first practice with the Sixers, as he drew rave reviews from his coaches and teammates.
Harden will be sidelined through the All-Star break but was still able to be productive during the practice session.
“We didn’t do anything live, but we did all the skeleton work,” Sixers coach Doc Rivers said. “All the defensive walkthrough stuff, all the shooting, did everything everybody else did. Obviously, he’s a high IQ basketball player so a lot of the things we do is stuff he does anyway and some of the other things we just throw out there and had him do it, and he kind of figured it out. It was good.”
Sometimes it could take a while for players to get used to new situations, especially during the middle of the season. One of his new teammates doesn’t foresee that being an issue, however.
“I don’t see it taking too long,” Georges Niang said. “I think the most underrated thing about James’s game is how smart he is. He’s constantly asking questions, picking up on things, you can see him looking at different things where he’s picking his spots, and I don’t see that taking too long. I’m just happy that I’m not on the other side of a James Harden team because in Utah it seemed like every year he was knocking us out of the playoffs.”
