James Harden of course became the talk of the NBA this week when the Houston Rockets finally relented and acquiesced to the disgruntled superstar’s trade demand.
Everyone involved with the league, including some of its biggest stars, unsurprisingly were willing to offer up a take on the four-team blockbuster deal that shipped Harden to the Brooklyn Nets.
The mega-deal that shipped Harden to Brooklyn has even inspired social media personalities to create comical videos, including Mark Phillips, who is the star of YouTube channel RDCworld1.
In a hilarious spoof, Phillips imagines how LeBron James might have reacted to Harden creating a “Big Three” with Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving with the YouTube personality impersonating the Los Angeles Lakers star.
“So it’s James, Durant and Kyrie? I’m 36! I’m 36! Why is it everybody versus me?” Phillips, playing James, screams, as transcribed by ESPN. “I’m not Thanos! Stop throwing me the ball! I’m tired of doing this! I just beat the Warriors!”
None other than James has reacted to the viral video, which has amassed more than 8.7 million views on Twitter as of Thursday evening. It had another 1.9 million views on YouTube and another 1.2 million looks on Phillips’ Instagram page.
In a tweet shared Thursday afternoon, James makes it clear he thoroughly enjoyed the satirical video, even quoting one of the lines Phillips shouts while portraying him.
“But what’s crazy about LeBron is that we make videos involving him … so when he did it, it’s like, I didn’t think it was real,” Phillips told ESPN about James' tweet. “We were actually in the middle of filming a YouTube video and didn’t know he tweeted it. My nephew FaceTimed me and told me, and I was in shock.
“Immediately he was like, ‘You made it, you made it,’ and we couldn’t believe it at all, but we were just yelling in joy and all just crowded around one phone with the highest level of excitement.”
James of course also was asked about his reaction to the Harden blockbuster trade, hardly a surprise given his status as the face of the NBA and one of its elder statesman and most outspoken voices.
Perhaps as expected, the Lakers superstar made it clear that he has far more important things to worry about with his squad than pay much attention to the goings-on with other teams.
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