Philadelphia Sixers star James Harden is no stranger to how trade negotiations tend to go, but this may be his bumpiest path to a new destination yet.

Unlike Harden's previous teams, the Sixers seemingly have no interest in going into a full rebuild, which could limit the type of assets the team is willing to receive.

Philadelphia's requested return for Harden, 33, has reportedly been described as “unreasonable” by competing NBA executives, according to Kyle Neubeck of PhillyVoice.com.

“Philadelphia's position on a James Harden trade has been described as “unreasonable” by competing executives, while the team has pushed back on that notion. They view their path to a Harden trade to accomplish one of two things — they want to get back a package that allows them to stay in the same tier of contention, sources say, or to make a trade that returns enough assets back to flip for another high-level player.”

Because the Sixers have plenty of motivation to remain a contender, particularly with reigning MVP Joel Embiid growing more restless for a title, trading Harden for unproven pieces may not line up with Philadelphia's timeline.

Potentially interested suitors, including the Los Angeles Clippers, would be acquiring Harden because they are also in “win-now” mode. Mutually beneficial trades between contenders who are both trying to remain in contention are pretty rare. Multi-team deals can be complicated as well, as Neubeck detailed for PhillyVoice.com.

“While there has been a lot of speculation that the Sixers could try to spin a Harden trade into a multi-team deal to chase a star, there does seem to be some pushback on the idea that they could execute that style of asset-flipping trade simultaneously with a Harden deal. The Sixers would prefer to be able to make or keep the team as competitive as possible as soon as possible, but they believe that requires getting an All-Star-level return for Harden in the event that they trade him.”

Harden, who led the NBA in assists per game last season, will be entering his 15th NBA season. Which team he'll be suiting up for remains to be seen.