The league already investigated the Sixers for this and didn’t find anything. If there was actually any sort of handshake deal, Harden was stomping on that as soon as Christmas Day 2022, not even halfway through the regular season when his camp started leaking that he was wanting to go back to Houston.

If there was a handshake deal, my guess is that it was contingent on playoff success, and Harden started getting cold feet after the really rough start to the season, so he started those leaks to try and leverage a deal early either with the Sixers or the Rockets. Word on the street is Udoka shut that down on Houston’s end, and then no other team wanted him (or didn’t make an offer that he was interested in) so he was essentially forced to opt in to the second year with Philly.

The way I see it, Harden is trying to save face as well as garner the support of other players by trying to put the blame 100% on Morey.