Oklahoma City Thunder last season became the youngest to win an NBA title led by 2025 MVP Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, Chet Holmgren and Jalen Willians. That distinction had a legit chance of going to OKC’s former Big 3 unfortunately, they had to break up Kevin Durant, Russell Westbrook, and James Harden.
Discussion on OKC 2010s era gets revived after KD and Harden talked about it in the Netflix documentary Starting 5. They reminisced about their starting years and the “what if”s of it. The Beard thought they had the promise to contend against the Heat for the title.
“My rookie year we lost to the Lakers who won a championship. My second year, we lost to Dallas when Dirk [Nowitzki] won his first championship. My third year, we lost to the Heat in the Finals when LeBron [James] gwon his championship. I was in a great space,” Harden said in the first episode.
“My mindset was different. I’m coming in next year, championship for sure in Oklahoma City. It was over. It’s just one of those said stories for real.”
Harden was the Thunder’s sixth man but he got traded to the Houston Rockets in 2012, creating his own legacy there and winning one MVP for himself like KD and Westbrook.
Durant did not like the break up, too. Several players congratulated Harden for receiving a lucrative contract but KD thought that at the back up those congratulations, they are happy that the Thunder Big 3 was no more.
“I never thought there was a possibility he was leaving, though,” Durant said in the Netflix show.
“And what really pissed me off is like [LeBron James], and [Dwyane Wade], and so many dudes around the NBA sending tweets out like, ‘congrats to my bro James. He got his.’ like ‘He’s going to Houston he going to kill there.’ when they was just happy we wasn’t together no more. They was so happy I know [LeBron James] and them was so [expletive] happy we wasn’t together anymore…I was like shut the [expletive] up y’all just was [expletive] scared y’all knew we was on the way.”
Lebron James’ message to Kevin Durant, OKC resurfaces
King James, who had his own Big 3 then, was indeed happy for Harden. This Netflix show prompted fans to dig up his specific post about the trade and now, people are feasting on it after KD’s claims.
Damn @JHarden13 got traded to H-Town! Figured something would happen with that situation but not this fast. #NBAFiles
— LeBron James (@KingJames) October 28, 2012
https://t.co/f72sMKJpx5 pic.twitter.com/7v7yKEiKpy
— Niko (@nikotaughtyou) October 16, 2025
Some are now speculating this James’ message is the reason why KD went in god mode against Lebron and the Cavaliers in two 2017 and 2018 NBA championships.
This genuinely might explain the way KD played in the 2017 final. He was playing with real hatred https://t.co/cVIiMETr8E pic.twitter.com/6OSaI8jc6f
— Jota the Slotter (@OriginalOLAJ) October 16, 2025
Lebron is a tactician lmaooo. He just never accounted for the existence of the warriors https://t.co/48UHHzh7Gg
— Sam 🐐☘️ (@S_Scott019) October 16, 2025
Niggas mad at Bron old tweet… https://t.co/sXmawTK5Ax pic.twitter.com/cHN2HOSpdA
— God Ghost Writer 👁🗨 (@kingchudy) October 16, 2025
James might happy for the OKC Big 3 break up but he was never reticent in saying how deadly they could have been. In 2018, he said that he once envisioned Thunder to give them a hard time for multiple seasons.
“I thought it would be in OKC,” he said. “I thought we’d have to face them for a while. Yeah, absolutely. Who wouldn’t see that?”
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