When the Philadelphia 76ers were eliminated by the Celtics in last season’s NBA Eastern Conference Semifinals, it didn’t come exactly as a surprise that coach Doc Rivers was asked to fall on the sword.
Despite having championship aspirations, the Sixers saw another season come to a crashing close. Philadelphia’s failure to make it to last year’s NBA Finals was an abject disappointment, and largely reflected on the likes of Rivers, Joel Embiid, and James Harden.
Rivers has since relished the opportunity to return to TV.
This will be his third stint as a broadcaster, but his first appearance since the 2003-04 season when he worked as an analyst for the NBA on ABC. ESPN’s revamped lead NBA broadcast team will make their season debut, as Rivers along with Mike Breen and Doris Burke, will be on the call when the New York Knicks host the Boston Celtics at 7 p.m. Eastern time.
“This is something — when I was a player, I studied it,” he said during a recent ESPN conference call when asked why he returned to the TV. “I worked at Turner in the summertime as an intern. This is something I really enjoy doing. I love basketball, and I like being around it and I like talking about it, and I want people to enjoy it and learn it.”
That’s the real answer. But the joking one would be because of his relationship with Harden, which he alluded to during an appearance on The Dan Patrick Show Wednesday. Never one to shy away from the tough questions, Patrick asked Rivers what he would say if an NBA general manager called him up and asked for his honest opinion on Harden.
"Our relationship, it was an honest one. It's probably why I'm doing TV."
-Doc Rivers details his relationship with James Harden, and shares at what point things changed for James last season#brotherlylove pic.twitter.com/Jg0KpWy04T
— Dan Patrick Show (@dpshow) October 25, 2023
“That’s maybe the best question someone’s asked me,” Rivers told Patrick. “He wasn’t playing right…I tell everyone, go back to the first half of last year, when he gave himself to the team. Dan, we were the best team in the NBA for a 10-20-game stretch. Obviously, we have Joel and Tyrese [Maxey] and Tobias [Harris], but we were [the best team in the NBA] because James was being a point guard.”
“It’s funny, a coach called me and said, ‘I never thought anyone could get him to do that.’ And, he did—for a short term. That’s what I would tell them. And if you can keep him in that, and not wanting to chase numbers or running [up] the score, the thirst of scoring, then you have a terrific player.”
Patrick pressed Rivers and asked him what had changed with Harden, who he said was playing “perfectly.”
“He really was,” Rivers added. “I would say not making the All-Star team really bothered him. I thought that was egregious that the coaches just didn’t put him on. But he was only leading the league in assists. He was having his best three-point percentage shooting year of his career. He was averaging plus-20. And the coaches didn’t put him on the All-Star team. He would never say this, but in my gut, I thought it changed almost immediately.”
Rivers recalled that about a game or two after his All-Star snub, Harden called him and told him that he wanted to play with the second unit more. The 62-year-old Rivers wasn’t born yesterday. He knew exactly what that meant—Harden wanted to take more shots and go back to attacking and playing.
“We had our ups and downs from that point on,” he said. “You know it’s funny about our relationship, it was an honest one. It’s probably why I’m doing TV right now. But you have to be honest as a coach, and you have to just keep selling it. ‘Listen when you do this, it may not be the best or the most fun for you, but we’re a better team.’ I never relented on that, and I thought he appreciated it that, even at the very end.”
That type of candidness will certainly help Rivers as he makes his latest transition to TV. As For Harden, he reportedly joined his teammates for practice Wednesday ahead of Philadelphia’s opener on Thursday. Harden has been seeking a trade since picking up his $35.6 million player option for the 2023-24 season, after indicating that his relationship with GM Daryl Morey is broken beyond repair.
