The Los Angeles Clippers are quietly trying to turn their season around right now, riding a season-high three-game win streak. Of course, when a team is 9-21 on the year, Los Angeles still has a ways to go to return to semi-relevance. Most recently, Brook Lopez connected on an astounding nine triples while pulling off a surprise 119-103 victory against the Portland Trail Blazers on Friday night.
Still, big picture, this is an LA team in turmoil. To make matters worse, the Clippers owe their first-round pick in a supposedly loaded 2026 draft to the reigning champion Oklahoma City Thunder — meaning they won’t even get to enjoy the one caveat from a season logged in the lottery.
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Perhaps bringing back some future equity would behoove the team. 11-time All-Star point guard James Harden, LA’s best player, could likely fetch some value on the trade market.
However, Jake Fischer of The Stein Line reports that the Clippers are, perhaps somewhat surprisingly, reticent to part with the former 2018 MVP.
“The Clippers, for the record, continue to message that they don’t want to trade Harden no matter how often rival teams whisper that they are anticipating exactly that between now and Feb. 5,” writes Fischer.
Harden has a partially guaranteed $42.3 million player option for the 2026-27 season, meaning the 36-year-old could in theory become an unrestricted free agent next summer.
“Harden indeed claimed a spot on The Stein Line’s annual All-No-Trade Team last week because — playing on what the league treats as a one-year deal with the same team he finished last season with — Harden is classified as a One-Year Bird this season who can’t be traded without his consent even though he does not possess a full no-trade clause,” Fischer adds.
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This season, Harden has been putting up superlative stats on offense, although he’s lost some quickness and is even more disengaged on defense than usual. Still, he’s a solid halfcourt option and could be a good fit on a roster looking for guard help and amenable to his limitations.
Through 28 healthy bouts, the 6-foot-5 Arizona State product has been averaging 26.3 points on .441/.372/.887 shooting splits, 8.0 dimes, and 5.0 boards.
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