76ers trade disgruntled guard James Harden to Clippers: reports

James Harden publicly called his boss a liar and swore he would never again play for the Philadelphia 76ers.

So he won’t — the 10-time all-star with a history of trade demands only slightly shorter than his signature beard is on the move to his fifth NBA team, chasing his first championship, this time in his native California.

Harden joins Kawhi Leonard, Paul George and Russell Westbrook to shape a core group of veterans trying to win the Los Angeles Clippers their first NBA title in franchise history.

The 76ers are simply trying to move on from the Harden Headache and continue their own long shot bid at a championship behind reigning NBA MVP Joel Embiid and star-in-waiting Tyrese Maxey.

The final haul was yet to be settled on Tuesday — coach Nick Nurse and Maxey danced around the topic of the trade following practice — but the key parts were this: the 76ers sent Harden, P.J. Tucker and Filip Petrusev to Los Angeles for Marcus Morris, Robert Covington, Nic Batum, K.J. Martin, a 2028 unprotected first-round draft pick, two second-round picks, a 2029 draft-pick swap and an additional first-rounder from a third team, a person familiar with the trade told The Associated Press.

The person spoke to the AP on condition of anonymity because the final details of the trade were not yet official.

Maxey texted the 34-year-old Harden when word of the deal broke overnight — Nurse said he slept through the trade call — and thanked his former teammate for his contributions in 79 total regular-season games with the 76ers.

“I told him I loved him, told him I appreciated him,” Maxey said. “One thing he really installed in me was confidence. I’ve always been a confident person. He made me be even more confident than I already was. All I can do is appreciate him for that.”

Maxey turns 23 on Saturday and has improved his numbers in each of his first three seasons — 8.5 points per game to 17.5 to 20.3 to 30.3 and his first Eastern Conference Player of the Week award in a small sample this season. That improvement has the 76ers finally believing he can be the star to pair with Embiid and remain contenders. Not Ben Simmons. Not Harden.

“Everything’s been going well, the flow’s been well, the organization’s been great, the team believes, the coach believes in himself,”…