James Harden was dumb to put the Sixers in a corner. His new diss video is a dumber way of doubling down.

James Harden the negotiator is in the same spot that James Harden the player often finds himself.

He doesn’t have a leg to stand on.

Not a healthy one, anyway.

He is the one who put the 76ers in a corner. He is the one who misjudged his market value. He is the one who tried to take the money and run. Now, he is the one with nowhere to run to.

Harden can release as many diss tape videos as he wants. Hey, put a beat to the next one. Go full Eight Mile. If Harden isn’t careful, he may well end up playing Detroit.

» READ MORE: Harden: ‘Daryl Morey is a liar and I will never be a part of an organization that he’s a part of’

That’s what he doesn’t seem to understand. As long as the Sixers have little to gain by trading him, they have little to lose by keeping him. They’ve lived through plenty of disruptions. They’ve been to as many conference finals with Harden as they have without him. Unless they can trade him for something that makes them a materially better team than they would have been if he’d opted out, what difference does it make if he refuses to play? He’s the one who needs another team to want him bad enough to make a compelling offer. Yet everything he and his advisors have said over the last eight months seems almost intentionally designed to limit his market value.

Set aside the question of whether Daryl Morey is, in fact, a liar. Harden made the allegation in an explosive video released early Monday in which he declared that he would never be part of an organization with Morey at its helm. Privately, team officials have vehemently denied the suggestion that Morey made Harden any promises about a long-term deal. Furthermore, sources have been adamant that, when the Sixers agreed to explore a trade, they were clear that they would act only if it made competitive sense to do so. You can argue that what really matters is that Harden feels as if he was lied to. Problem is, feels aren’t always real. And the benefit of the doubt rarely goes to the guy who is trying to bully his way out of a third team in four years.

Harden’s biggest issue right now is the narrative that he has created for himself going all the way back to Christmas Day. That’s when someone with knowledge of his thinking thought it would be wise to let the world know that he was more focused on returning to the Rockets than he was on playing in the Sixers’ nationally-televised game against the Knicks. Was that really supposed to make Josh Harris feel more comfortable with making a long-term investment in him? Was it really supposed to make another owner ante up on the trade market this summer?

Keep in mind, this was two months into the season. That’s well before Harden could have been upset with the Sixers for whatever their final offer ended up being. Obviously, there’s no proof that Harden’s camp leaked the news directly. But that’s how it was interpreted internally. The own goal is even more egregious if those interpretations were incorrect. Harden easily could have easily cleared things up and sent a clear signal that he wanted to sign for the long haul. Instead, he allowed the issue to linger over the rest of the season.

» READ MORE: Why the Sixers have flexibility to remake their roster around Joel Embiid and Tyrese Maxey

Nobody wants to make a long-term commitment to a chronic malcontent. Harden found that out the hard way this offseason, when the rest of the NBA decided it wasn’t interested in signing up to be the latest chapter in the league’s longest running serial drama. Does he really think the answer is to make that drama even more explosive?

The worst thing Harden can do is push the Sixers to a point where they can no longer stomach the thought of capitulation. If I was Sixers ownership, I might already be there. Three months ago, they gave him a choice. They would pay him $35 million to play basketball for them, or they would pay him nothing and set him free to find somewhere else to play. Instead, Harden decided that he would take their money and also find somewhere else to play.

Think about that for a moment. Imagine this wasn’t the NBA. Imagine this was some other business, and some other contractor agreeing on terms for services rendered. If you are Harris, how do you proceed? You give a guy a $35 million job offer, the guy accepts, and then he immediately announces that he’s keeping your money but no longer wants the job.

That’s not the exact way it went down, but it’s pretty close in principle. Harden’s righteous indignation rings awfully hollow given the fact that he opted in for another year with Morey a month ago. He had an opportunity to become a free agent and say goodbye to the guy forever. The whole point of including an opt-out clause in his contract was to give him that flexibility. He decided he’d rather have $35 million.

That’s the key factor here. Harden had a choice. He could choose to play for the Sixers, or he could choose to play anywhere else he damn well pleased. He knew the rewards of opting in, and he knew the responsibilities. In essence, the Sixers were offering him $35 million in exchange for his freedom. Everything he wants right now he could have gotten immediately by declining.

That’s what what makes the whole situation far sleazier and more difficult to navigate than your average NBA contract dispute. When Harden demanded a trade from the Rockets, and then the Nets, he at least had some sort of ethical cover, some way to rationalize the legitimacy of his chosen path. When he’d agreed to those contracts, he’d done so under a certain set of circumstances. Then, the circumstances changed. He was operating in good faith when he signed those deals. And he was operating in good faith when he requested to leave.

That’s not the case here. Harden knew exactly what he was doing when he opted into the contract. He certainly wasn’t operating in good faith.

» READ MORE: James Harden’s demands bring another Summer of Simmons situation to Daryl Morey and the Sixers

Think about where that leaves the Sixers. In other circumstances, it might make some sense for them to get Harden on the first flight out of town. Do the guy a solid, minimize the disruption, take something rather than nothing, wish him well. If he is determined not to play for you, you don’t have much to gain by forcing him to sit.

Here, they at least have principle and precedent to uphold. If the Clippers aren’t offering a deal that’s worth more than those two things, why would the Sixers bother accepting? Reality is, there may not be much of a difference between paying $35 million for Harden not to play and paying $35 million for Marcus Morris, Robert Covington and change. It only makes sense for the Sixers to pull the trigger on a deal if they feel like it puts them in a materially better position to contend than they’d be in otherwise.

That’s obviously not the outcome they are hoping for. They clearly think that their best chances lie with Harden in uniform. I happen to agree with that. But it really doesn’t matter. What matters is that they will not be any worse off getting nothing for Harden that they would be accepting anything less than the Clippers’ best offer. That’s the silver lining in being a team that has never gotten out of the second round. You don’t need anything more than Joel Embiid and Tyrese Maxey to lose in the conference semis.

Will it be ideal to have the Harden situation lingering into training camp? Of course not. Could Harden find a way to make things uncomfortable? Sure. But these are the Sixers. They are built on a foundation of discomfort. They once had a season that began with Ben Simmons playing with his phone in the middle of practice. It ended in the same place as it did last season.

It would be a shame if this thing ends that way. But the Sixers should be willing to live with that possibility, and it appears that they are. I’m not sure Harden fully grasps the various ways this could go south for him. Right now, the worst that can happen for the Sixers is that it ends up being the same ol’ October.