The Sixers are back! Did you miss them?

Well, they haven’t been gone entirely, but injuries, trades, and off-court suspensions have left them a shell of themselves for nearly the past two months. With Paul George back from his suspension and Joel Embiid returning from his 13-game injury absence, we are finally once again seeing something resembling what you all would consider to be The 2026 Sixers. Embiid’s 35 point night along with PG’s 28 in a resounding win against Chicago Wednesday night was a great refresher on what this team can look like when mostly healthy.

In case you (understandably) tuned out in the time that the stars were gone, the Sixers held down the fort pretty well. They went a respectable 13-12 over the PG suspension, which has left them still firmly in the mix for a playoff / play-in spot. They are currently sitting at seventh with no more than a game of space in either direction in the standings.

Anyway, let’s get to some big picture thoughts as the regular season winds down — plus a very necessary reflection on Markelle Fultz.

Paul George, is there any boat in you?

With PG returning to the court after his 25 game suspension, I thought it might be a good idea to zoom out a bit and discuss the perception of him and his Sixers tenure.

When Paul George signed with the Sixers, one could have easily predicted that he would have become somewhat of a background character in the minds of Sixers and NBA fans in general – his mild-mannered, non-controversial personality combined with his extremely malleable game and a willingness to be the third banana made it somewhat inevitable.

But I’ve got to say, I do find the ratio of how pathetic his Sixers tenure has been vs. the amount of criticism he’s received to be a bit out of whack. Man, this has been one of the saddest stints that any great NBA player has ever had, and you almost never hear it spoken about that way.

Last year, Bleacher Report ranked their Top 100 NBA players of all time, and George came in at 78th. Of all the players in George’s vicinity, give or take 10 spots, I’m not sure you could find a single one with a stint as truly sad as his Sixers tenure on their résumé – talking and behaving like he’s still in his prime while making a max salary, but playing in only half the games, at a performance level equal to about half the value of his salary. Not to mention the mild but “this could only happen to him” off-court stuff — getting caught in traffic at an Eagles parade; letting out a disgusted “hell naw!” when asked by streamer Speed if he was from Philadelphia; getting suspended 25 games for an undisclosed, non-PED substance. Just a bizarre comedy of errors combined with extremely underwhelming play on the court.

And that makes the situation that he’s in now much more interesting. He’s coming off of a two-month, non-injured rest. He still has the ability to transform games on the defensive end and occasionally go off for 30 points. A 2-3 week heater for PG in April could legitimately lead to the best playoff series win the Sixers would have on their résumé for this entire era. He has a chance to lock in for a month and change the perception of his Sixers tenure from a complete and utter joke to a very respectable and fondly remembered stretch.

My only question is if he has the willpower to do it. Does he even care? If he goes down as a universally negatively perceived Sixer and becomes perceived as irredeemably washed by the entire league, would it even bother him? Would he be somewhat happy about it, given that it’d make him more likely to be traded? As the famous Ricky voicemailer once asked, is there any boat in his gut?

I don’t know, to be honest. I think PG is kind of a loser – I said as much before they signed him – but he certainly has had some very respectable playoff runs in the past, along with some very bad ones. If he’s got any motivation left whatsoever to shift the perception of him in this town and elsewhere, we’re gonna have to see some borderline legendary shit over the next month or so out of him.

If there’s one positive thing to look forward to the rest of this season, I’d say it’s that we have a high probability of the Sixers being mostly healthy and playing meaningful basketball in April. If nothing else, we will get to see what these guys are really made of and whether they were ever worth investing our energy into.

Joel Embiid discourse

There really is no point in trying to have a good-faith discussion about Joel Embiid with anyone these days. I often debate whether or not to even weigh in; everyone is completely dug in at this point and there is no desire for anyone to change their mind. As a self-avowed Embiid centrist, I so often feel as though there is no one else sharing my ideological perspective on him.

A couple weeks ago, a viral tweet went around about how Embiid’s total number of missed games (then 485) was equal to his number of games played since entering the league. And naturally, like every time a fancy new “Embiid bad” stat drops, the haters ate it up.

And yes, he is the most injury-prone star of his generation. No question. I suppose my only question is why all of the discussion around this feels so mean-spirited and hate-fueled. He has been injured many times, almost all of them from bad falls, contact from opposing players, or just freak accidents. It’s not like he has been racking up non-contact soft tissue injuries year after year. Insofar as Embiid has ever been “out of shape,” it’s never been more than perhaps 5-10 percent below the conditioning standard of where you’d want him to be – and I’m not making an excuse for that! I’m merely asking where the impetus for all the hate and/or eye-rolling comes in.

Let’s instead make some attempt to discuss his career in the proper context and discuss how Embiid arrived at these numbers. 164 of those missed games came from missing two seasons at the start of his career, caused by a navicular bone injury that has outright ended the career of multiple legendary big men, including Bill Walton and Yao Ming. Practically no one thought he’d come back from that injury and have a 10-plus year career, let alone a Hall of Fame one.

He then came back and all he did was become the NBA’s all time leader in points per minute. He is one of 18 players ever to have three top two MVP finishes. He is perhaps the greatest scoring big man ever, who also happened to make two all-defense teams (which should have been more – he deserved in in 2020-21 and 2021-22).

Jonathan Kuminga fell on his knee when he was at his absolute peak and he’s never been the same. Another 126 of those missed games have come since that incident. He bounced back more than anyone expected this year and put up All-Star caliber numbers for over a month. Not quite a miracle, but a pretty cool comeback story.

And yet, around 65 percent of basketball fans look at him and go “what a loser, fuck him.” It’s insane. These people are unwell. You would think this guy was like an Andrew Bynum-level player who was wildly overhyped, became a constant malcontent, ate his way out of the league and hated basketball.

I am not saying and have never said there aren’t valid criticisms to be made of Embiid. I have made them many times! But the level of bloodlust for the guy and the attempts to remove all context for what he career has been is unlike anything I have ever seen. When future generations discover him, I predict there will be a massive shift – perhaps even an overcorrection – on Embiid. They will see the stats, the story, and the injuries, and the failures that he had in the playoffs will become more and more of faint memories. At that point, I may have to help try to swing the pendulum back to reality by reminding everyone just how bad some of those playoff performances really were.

In the meantime, I find myself bewildered by how such a large portion of present-day basketball fans look at an incredible, yet tragic career and just despise him. I promise you all, it will not age well.

Markelle Fultz is back

In case you missed it, former Sixers No. 1 overall pick Markelle Fultz is back in the NBA. He recently signed a 10-day contract with the Toronto Raptors after a brief stint with their G-League team.

Last week, when I saw a clip of Markelle Fultz hitting a game-winner pop up on my timeline, and a lot of thoughts came racing across my mind. First of all, even though it’s a G-League defense, that clip was still a marvel to watch. Fultz still has that insanely smooth, slippery quality off the dribble that combines elite athleticism with incredible rhythm and coordination. I don’t think there are 20 players in the league today who could execute that exact move in that exact way.

As I watched it, I thought to myself, “man, he would have been a goddamn monster if he never lost the shot.” He would have been a taller, longer, stronger, better-passing C.J. McCollum. He remains one of the best guard prospects I have ever watched.

And as I’m thinking about all of this, another thought occurs to me. How do we not talk about Markelle Fultz every single day? How has any Sixers fan or person with knowledge of the situation moved past it? How are we not overcome with dread with the realization of how different life would be if Fultz had never lost the jumper?

Fultz self-destructing was really the original sin that sent this entire thing careening into a perpetual cycle of risky gambles – you could easily argue that none of the Butler, Tobias, Horford, Harden, or Paul George acquisitions occur if Fultz just meets expectations.

And what if he was better than expectations? If he really pops as a rookie, do they make the Finals as early as 2018? It might sound ridiculous, but think about how much the Celtics series that year changed when T.J. freaking McConnell entered the starting lineup. If the Sixers have normal guard play, they have a chance against that Celtics team.

With Fultz being a good, normal, developing young prospect who fills the huge void they had at self-creation on the perimeter, there is no desperate cycle of Jimmy Butler-Tobias Harris-Al Horford moves trying to fill out the roster around Embiid and Simmons in a way that complements them – they would’ve already had it!

Robert Covington would have been a career Sixer. Dario Saric would have lived out his prime here and eventually transitioned into the backup stretch five that was promised. JJ Redick probably re-signs on one-year deals until he retires. With Fultz in the mix, why would they trade away the Mikal Bridges pick for another guard in Zhaire Smith?

Let’s pretend Simmons still blows up when he does – can you imagine what watching the Sixers would have been like from 2018-2021 with that outcome? We could have watched a Fultz-Bridges-Covington-Simmons-Embiid starting lineup, with total cap flexibility through 2019, and no missing future draft picks.

I just… I don’t know how to ever get over knowing what we missed out on. Instead, we got this never-ending cycle of mistakes that has been one desperate attempt after another to fill the void of talent and assets originally left by Fultz going sideways.

I’ll never get over it, sadly. I’m sorry for harping on it, guys. The world just needs to be reminded of what could (should!) have been. I may need to write this exact column once a year just for my own emotional well-being. We will call it Markelle Fultz Remembrance Day.

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Mike O’Connor is the best O’Connor in basketball writing. Previously of The Athletic, you can find Mike on Twitter @MOConnor_NBA. Mike’s writing is brought to you by Body Bio, supplements based on science, focusing on your gut and brain health.

Every once in a while, I marvel at how much the Ricky has changed over the years, while somehow maintaining the essence of what it’s always been. The Ricky has always been great, and it has never strayed from the core of what it is, but it used to represent something entirely different.

If you haven’t been around for 10-plus years, you likely don’t have any clue what the vibe of the Ricky was like during the peak Process years. The podcast and the community around it were not exactly designed for mass appeal. It was more like an ideological cult podcast than a Sixers podcast – it was, in fact, actively hostile towards many Sixers fans. If you didn’t support Sam Hinkie, you would likely be subject to the ire of all within the Ricky community.

There was an “Enemies of The Process” ranking that included random beat writers and personalities on Twitter! The “banned” list used to be much more of a formal thing – if you were on it, you really were banned from the podcast! An average day on Twitter in 2015 was some random Bucks blogger posting something like “Sam Hinkie isn’t that good of a GM, actually” and proceeding to be dogpiled by hundreds of Ricky listeners. It was awesome. I don’t regret a single second of it. It is so crazy that it has grown into what it is now and that I am now a part of it.

Anyway, the reason for the walk down memory lane here is the fact that I’d bet most readers don’t even know what the word in the headline of this article references. “Zugzwang” is a German term describing a situation in chess in which the player is forced to move, but every available move only weakens their position. It was referenced by Sam Hinkie in his farewell letter, almost exactly 10 years ago.

From Hinkie: “The NBA can be a league of desperation, those that are in it and those that can avoid it. So many find themselves caught in the zugzwang, the point in the game where all possible moves make you worse off. Your positioning is now the opposite of that.”

Well Sam, it’s 10 years later, your friend Daryl is now running the team, and I fear that we are now in the zugzwang. It’s a sentiment I’ve been feeling ever since the trade deadline, and I just can’t seem to shake it. I am still more optimistic than most on this Sixers season; I still would bet on them making the playoffs. But with the season teetering on the brink, I’ve been wondering more and more about the long-term outlook. And I just can’t help but wonder if their current long term position is the zugzwangiest that any team has ever zugzwanged. Every move – including standing pat – seems to be the wrong move.

I just want to run through a quick hypothetical with you. Imagine the Sixers rally to make the playoffs, but lose somewhat honorably in the first round. If they run back mostly the same roster next year and a year or two beyond, they’ll probably win 40-46 games per year and have a shot at winning a round if healthy for the playoffs. If they trade Paul George and picks for either another veteran wing or multiple younger, but inferior wings, they’ll probably win 40-46 games for the next few years and have a shot at winning a round if healthy for the playoffs. If they trade Joel Embiid for a younger, healthier, but worse center – let’s call him Domantas Sabonis – they’ll probably win 40-46 games and have a shot at winning a round if healthy for the playoffs.

They are stuck in the middle with no way out. The idea of running it back, barring a miraculous playoff run, sounds terrible – until you consider that we are in the zugzwang. We’re going to give up picks to get off of Paul George or Joel Embiid in order to potentially bring in worse versions of them, while not getting us either to title contention or to a point where we can bottom out and play the lottery? No thanks.

Let’s dig a bit deeper here. If the Sixers do run back the same core, they’ll have essentially zero flexibility to create a better version of their current roster; assuming they re-sign Quentin Grimes to around $10 million per year and keep the draft pick that they got in the McCain trade, they will immediately be around $8 million below the luxury tax. They could use that money to re-sign Kelly Oubre to a similar salary for next year, though that immediately puts them in tax territory. They could then still use the mini mid-level exception (around $5.7 million) to sign a free agent on the open market – but again, that requires paying the tax.

If the plan is to keep the current roster mostly in place and try to make another playoff run with Maxey-George-Embiid, I’d argue that the best course of action would be to re-sign Oubre and Grimes, keep the draft pick, use the mid-level exception, and be ready to package some of those guys along with 1-2 first round picks in a trade for a young, starting-caliber player. Let’s call that player Santi Aldama. That would, once again, require paying the luxury tax.

Still; even in that scenario, aren’t the Sixers still just a middle-of-the-pack playoff team at best, banking on a level of health from their stars that they’ll likely never get, while short another couple of draft picks? How is that better than doing nothing?

It only becomes slightly more logical when you consider the alternatives. If the Sixers look to trade Paul George, it certainly wouldn’t be impossible. They will have four trade-eligible first round picks this summer, including that appetizing 2028 Clippers pick. They could try to flip PG and a pick or two for another beleaguered but better aging wing – like Kawhi Leonard or Kevin Durant. They could also try to throw PG and all four of their trade-able firsts to some team willing to offload useful young wings. New Orleans might be a good fit there – PG and all the picks and swaps for Trey Murphy, Herb Jones, and Yves Missi would be nice. The roster suddenly makes a ton more sense. But, uh, are we really going to throw away most of our draft picks between now and 2032 in order to likely be a team that is still banking on Joel Embiid’s health to be anything approaching contender status?

If standing pat does nothing, and trading PG involves huge present and future risk, what about trading Embiid? There will almost certainly be options – Embiid has undeniably played his way into having some level of appeal, if not positive value to teams around the league. But any trade involving Embiid would likely mean giving up picks to bring back a player with less talent than Joel — perhaps Sabonis, as mentioned earlier.

For my taste, I’d go with door number two and trade for one of the veterans – watching Durant or Kawhi, even if they fall off a bit next season, would be pretty fun. They are both all-time greats, still playing at an All-NBA level. Alternatively, if they could trade PG and a handful of picks for the Pelicans package, they would at least be locked into a series of mid-40s win seasons for the next several years, regardless of what they get from Embiid.

I guess part of the reason that this question has been on my mind so much is that my fear is the Sixers will simply keep the same group together, change very little, and hope for the best for the next several years. I think the Jared McCain trade was partially a sign that the Sixers are not necessarily operating with a strict focus on the long term future; if they were, I think they would’ve valued the variance that comes with McCain’s potential much higher. I wonder if their plan is simply to be pretty good for a long time. Perhaps they’ll ride out the next few years bouncing between 40 and 46 wins depending on Embiid and George’s health, and whatever happens, happens. They’ll then hope to set up the next era with the Clippers picks plus Maxey and Edgecombe.

I can’t say I absolutely hate that possibility. I also can’t say I like it. What I can say is that I have no clue how to escape it. I just never thought we’d end up back here – stuck in the middle seemingly with no way out. We are in the exact spot Hinkie laid out in his letter. We are the mid-2010s Hawks, but weirder and worse.

I hope that Morey and company can pull a rabbit out of a hat this off-season to prove me wrong, but given what they just did at the trade deadline, I have a hard time believing that they have all that strong of an interest in winning now or winning later – or at least in doing the things it would take to accomplish either of those. Instead, they’d probably prefer to stay the course, spending the next couple years at a level that’s technically competitive but nowhere near contending, while those of us who still remember the Hinkie era wonder what the hell these last 15 years were all for.

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Mike O’Connor is the best O’Connor in basketball writing. Previously of The Athletic, you can find Mike on Twitter @MOConnor_NBA. Mike’s writing is brought to you by Body Bio, supplements based on science, focusing on your gut and brain health.

One of the biggest themes of this Sixers season has been the process for us as fans of psychologically adjusting our expectations from where they have been over the past several years. While it was tempting early on to view last year as a total fluke and see this year as a return to the perennial fringe contender status that the Sixers have occupied for nearly a decade, that simply is not the reality. As Beckett points out, this Sixers team is merely pretty good.

And within that psychological adjustment, one of the things that fans have had to get used to is that there is no longer a player on the team at the caliber of prime Joel Embiid. Tyrese Maxey is not Joel Embiid. VJ Edgecombe will probably be pretty awesome, but he will never be as good as Joel Embiid. Even the man himself – 2026 Embiid – is not particularly close to prime Embiid, especially on the defensive end, even if he’s closer to his prime self than we all had expected before this season. We very well may go the rest of our lifetimes without seeing another Sixer as good as prime Joel.

If you scroll through social media after any given Sixers loss, one thing you will see is a lot of consternation about the fact that Maxey simply cannot carry the Embiid and PG-less roster to a higher level of success. That noise has become especially loud as the Sixers’ performance without their two max stars has worsened over the course of the year — after winning their first couple games without Maxey’s co-stars, the Sixers are now 6-12 on the year in games that Maxey plays and Embiid and George both sit. Maxey’s scoring volume and efficiency have also tailed off over the course of the year, leaving many arguing that his torrid scoring pace to start the year was somewhat fluky.

Still, whenever I see people being overly critical of Maxey for that record, I want to remind them of how and why they are actually losing those games.

On the season, the Sixers have an acceptable net rating of +0.3 when Maxey is on the floor without George and Embiid. He is not lighting the world on fire, he is not carrying terrible lineups to crazy on/off splits like prime Embiid could — and yes, it certainly says something about his status as a player that we have basically seen two calendar years of Maxey playing without Embiid, and the results are conclusive that he cannot carry a high-level team by himself.

With that being said, the real problem is what happens in the (often very few!) minutes when Maxey sits. With all three of George, Embiid, and Maxey off the floor, the Sixers have a horrendous net rating of -18.7. In other words: most of these games involve Maxey keeping the Sixers roughly even for 40-42 minutes, and the Sixers getting obliterated in the 6-8 minutes that he sits. If they could even approach competency without their Big 3 on the floor, odds are that we’d be spending a lot less time talking about Maxey’s limitations as the lead guy. Frankly, the fact that he can carry a team to an even score for 40 minutes a night with $110 million sitting on the bench is a pretty impressive feat.

What’s more, the numbers this year also show that Maxey has been a far better solo act than Embiid – the Sixers are -14.3 points per 100 possessions in lineups with Embiid on the floor and without George and Maxey. In other words, Maxey without Embiid lineups have been far, far better than Embiid without Maxey lineups. Ironically, George has been the best one-man band of them all, carrying lineups to a +8.3 net rating when Maxey and Embiid sit — a lot of that likely has to do with small sample size (301 total possessions, per Cleaning The Glass).

And, importantly, while the net rating stats certainly illustrate my point, it bears mentioning that you can feel Maxey’s impact just by watching. Anyone following this team on a nightly basis who thinks they would be remotely competitive without Maxey is simply out of their mind. I’d be stunned if they were sitting on 20 wins right now if Maxey had missed the entire year.

Again, I am not making this defense of Maxey to say that the team without George and Embiid is actually awesome and that everyone needs to back off criticizing Maxey. His inability to create for others offensively and be a transformative defensive force will prevent him from ever reaching top-five player status, barring yet another shocking leap in his mid-late 20s.

Rather, I am making the case that the real problem is the lack of depth behind them, and that Maxey’s performance as a solo act is roughly what you would expect from a top-15ish player. If Maxey and Donovan Mitchell switched rosters at the beginning of the year, would the two teams’ records change dramatically? I would argue that they would not.

And unfortunately, at least in the case of this year, there is not much the Sixers can do to better handle the minutes when none of their stars are on the floor. Edgecombe is not yet ready to be the sort of offensive engine that can carry those lineups. Quentin Grimes and Kelly Oubre Jr. have their own well documented quirks and inconsistencies. The backup center tandem of Adem Bona and Andre Drummond has just not been good enough. If I were the Sixers, I would try to build my star-less lineups around defense. Assuming they run back mostly the same squad next year, I’d make a run at someone like Kris Dunn in free agency.

Regardless, I think a large part of the criticism Maxey faces comes largely because people had grown so used to Embiid carrying lineups for eight years that they forgot how big the difference is between a top-three player and a top-20 player. While the team isn’t winning many games with Maxey as the lone star, the massive difference between lineups with him in them and without him in them clearly show a star-level impact. We just need to cope with the fact that he is not Embiid 2.0 – and neither will be pretty much anyone else.

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Mike O’Connor is the best O’Connor in basketball writing. Previously of The Athletic, you can find Mike on Twitter @MOConnor_NBA. Mike’s writing is brought to you by Body Bio, supplements based on science, focusing on your gut and brain health.

Did the Sixers kill the vibes?

After the Paul George suspension and a gut punch of a trade deadline followed by a 1-3 skid and some re-emerging right knee soreness from Joel Embiid, it’s safe to say that the 2025-26 Sixers have hit the rockiest waters that they’ve hit all year.

As I’ll get into later on in this piece, I remain optimistic about the Sixers overall, but man, the last few weeks have been brutal. Here in this piece, I want to go through a wide range of thoughts I’ve had building up recently, ranging from the Sixers’ confounding trade deadline to their third quarter woes. Let’s get into it.

Setting the record straight regarding “The Tax”

There’s been a lot of talk in the aftermath of the trade deadline regarding the Sixers’ repeated pattern of ducking the luxury tax under Joshua Harris’ ownership. While I agree it’s obviously been a priority in their decision making, the actual story is a bit more complicated than raw, dogged cheapishness. My goal here is just to add some nuance, as well as discuss where we should blame Daryl Morey, rather than defend it.

The Sixers have paid the luxury tax twice this decade – in 2020-21, and 2021-22. In the 2022-23 season, the Sixers were right up against the luxury tax threshold, but paying it for a third consecutive year would have triggered the repeater tax, which would have given the Sixers a comically absurd payroll the following season and been a major hindrance towards their ability to build out a contender the following year.

If you recall, the Sixers traded away Matisse Thybulle for Jalen McDaniels to get under the tax at the 2023 trade deadline. While myself and many others were arguing that they should go for broke, try to win the title, and worry about next year in the summer, Morey and the Sixers decided to shed money to free up future flexibility, largely under the selling point that they had to do this in order to be able to retain James Harden that off-season.

And I just want to linger here for a minute, because I truly believe the decision to duck the tax in 2023 to be their biggest mistake of the past several deadlines. Remember: the trade that sent Thybulle to the Blazers was a multi-team trade that involved the Knicks sending a future first round pick in exchange for Josh Hart. The Sixers had one available first round pick to be traded at the time (their 2029 first). They more than likely could have sent Thybulle and that pick away in exchange for Hart (which I asked them to do very nicely at the time!), who would have helped their biggest weakness – rebounding – while providing some insurance to P.J. Tucker and Tobias Harris’ playoff inconsistencies. Tucker and Harris, of course, were both abysmal to varying levels against the Celtics and played a major role in the Sixers’ eventual loss. If Josh Hart is on that Sixers team, I would argue they win the title.

Morey stated at his post-deadline press conference last week that he hoped to dispel the notion that the Sixers refuse to pay the tax, and that it’s his responsibility to present ownership with a move worth paying for. Buddy, it was right there three years ago! You very possibly could have had Josh Hart on a team that was right around title contention but lacked toughness and rebounding. That’s a sale you have to make.

The year after that would have gotten sticky, of course. Retaining Harden would have been tough. Josh Harris would have had to pay an absolutely ridiculous luxury tax bill to keep the team together. Still – I would argue that the right call would have been to make that win-now trade and worry about the future later. If they have to pay another first to salary dump Tobias and/or Tucker, so be it. Hell, if Harden has to walk and the team needs a gap year, so be it – that’s what ended up happening anyway!

The reason I harp so much on 2023 is that, truthfully, I can’t blame them that much for not wanting to pay the tax in subsequent years. Of course, I would rather them just spend and eat the money. But at the 2024 trade deadline, nobody knew if Joel Embiid would be returning from his knee injury at all, let alone at full health. The only move they made that was a straight salary dump was getting off of Danuel House, Jr. – I can’t crush them for that, especially considering that they made another move that was attempting to win now in acquiring Buddy Hield.

Last season, with an impending tank job coming, I hated the fact that they had to pay picks to get off of K.J. Martin to get under the tax, but did it negatively impact that season in any real way? Of course not. If I owned the Sixers, I probably would have demanded the same thing. The team sucks, I’m not paying eight figures to keep K.J. Martin.

Even this year, I’m more annoyed than irate that they didn’t want to pay the luxury tax. What I’m irate about is how they went about it – they could have attached a second round pick or two to Andre Drummond and called it a day. Punting on Jared McCain’s future in part to get under the luxury tax is just unforgivable, and that’s a Daryl Morey decision more so than a Josh Harris decision.

In summation: obviously, I would love it if Josh Harris would just eat the money and pay the tax every year. But that is simply not what most NBA owners do. We should all crush him for it, but understand that this is how most NBA owners operate. It is a bigger problem that Morey simply cannot find ways to navigate Harris’ budget restraints in a productive or creative way. He has repeatedly made the wrong decision in light of these constraints, and he deserves much of the blame himself.

Why didn’t the Sixers value Jared McCain?

I’m feeling a lot of things in the aftermath of the McCain trade – angry, sad, frustrated. But the thing I am feeling most is confused. Why did the Sixers simply not value Jared McCain all that highly? I don’t get it. What did they watch last season?

I went into last season ready to be totally out of McCain; I compared him to Bryn Forbes before the draft! His 23 games as a rookie – specifically, his 13-game run in which he averaged 21.7 points per game – moved me in such a way that I would not have traded him for three first round picks this off-season. I was fully convinced he would be a multi-time All-Star.

What’s obvious now is that the Sixers never felt the same way, even in the midst of his run. As I wrote earlier this season, it was clear even before this year that the Sixers did not see him at the level that we did – let alone as a future franchise cornerstone.

I’ll never understand what made the Sixers not fully believe that what we saw from McCain during that stretch was real. This was not some unfathomably hot shooting stretch. It wasn’t even the case that he was playing with or against a bunch of depleted, tanking rosters at the end of the season; most of his games came with at least one of Joel Embiid or Paul George.

I remember two games specifically – against the Knicks and Magic in November of ‘24 – in which McCain shared the floor with both George and Embiid, and McCain was their most reliable source of offense. I found myself begging for them to get the ball out of Embiid’s hands and into McCain’s; the offense was just running better when the rookie had the ball.

Everything about McCain’s run felt legitimate to me. He was getting wherever he wanted off the dribble, he was out-maneuvering players off the ball and finding openings for cuts or open 3s, and he was an unbelievably poised passer. I truly could not point to one thing about his 13-game stretch last year that made me go, “ah, yep, that was a total fluke.”

The severity of his struggles this year did not make me rethink what happened last year; it was obvious that he simply wasn’t moving the same. I remember comparing his off the dribble game last year to Malcolm Brogdon’s at one point – he had that gallop-y, herky-jerky pace with the ball where every drive made you wonder, how did he get by that guy?

That stuff was gone this year. Coming off of his hand and knee injuries, his handle and burst were just completely zapped. But even as I concede that he was borderline unplayable for much of the year, I still fully believe in his ability to bounce back once healthy.

What’s clear now is that the Sixers believe either A) his injuries would prevent him from fully bouncing back, or B) the version of him that we believe he could bounce back to was mostly a fluke and was never that interesting to begin with, or some combination of both.

All I can say is that I vehemently disagree. I want to be on record as a huge McCain believer and as someone who was fervently against this trade.

Morey essentially confirmed everything I’m speculating about here at his press conference, stating that he was very confident that the team was “selling high” on McCain, but that only time will tell. Agreed on that last part – and if I’m wrong about McCain, I’ll happily give Daryl his flowers. But for now I’d like to stake out as strong a position on the opposite side as possible.

The Sixers’ mismanagement of free agency costs them draft picks

In the aftermath of the trade deadline, one small silver lining that many people have pointed out is that the Sixers now have a whopping 14 trade-eligible second round picks. Hooray!

That is an objectively impressive number for a team that has spent all but one of the past eight years trying to win. But that’s not going to stop me from pointing out that it could easily have been way more if not for the Sixers’ penchant for ducking the tax combined with their many blunders in free agency.

In 2022, the Sixers signed P.J. Tucker and Danuel House, Jr. in free agency. They were subsequently fined two second round picks for tampering. A year later, they salary dumped Tucker as part of the James Harden trade. While we can’t know for sure, let’s be generous and assume that it cost just one second round pick to get off of Tucker.

A few months after that, they salary dumped Danuel House to the Pistons, costing them a second round pick. A few months later, in the summer of 2024, they signed K.J. Martin and Eric Gordon. Last year at the trade deadline, they paid two second round picks to salary dump Martin. And this year, they salary dumped Gordon by giving Memphis a 2032 second round pick.

All told, that’s seven second round picks that the Sixers cost themselves due to poor free agent signings – none of whom ever made more than $10 million per year.

Again, this all ties back to my first point. Having a cheap owner is annoying, but the real problem is a general manager who can’t navigate it adeptly. The Sixers have 14 second-round picks – four of which came from trading a 2026 first round pick, and three of which came from trading McCain – but they could easily have far more if they would have either A) been willing to eat some tax money, or B) handled free agency any better from 2022-24.

The Sixers getting blown out in every third quarter is not “random”

I just wanted to echo this piece from Beckett about the Sixers’ unrelenting third quarter struggles. As Beckett points out, we are past the threshold of this being some “random” sample size thing at the beginning of the season. It has to have some quantifiable explanation based in reality at this point.

That word – “random” – has been massively overused as our understanding of shot variance and sample size has improved. We need to stop slapping that label on any statistical trend that appears without a clear and direct explanation.

As this post on Sixers Reddit points out, this year’s Sixers have the second-worst third quarter net rating in recorded history. The Sixers getting obliterated in every third quarter is not “random” any more than the 2016-17 Warriors destroying their opponents in every third quarter was “random.”

Most likely, it is psychological. The Sixers turn their brains off every third quarter. The blame belongs to the head coach and the players. They need to find ways to be more focused and intentional with their third quarters. It will legitimately cost them the season if they don’t!

I still remain a 2026 Sixers optimist!

I feel like I’ve been quite negative here – sorry! I do want to be clear that I remain optimistic about this year’s team.

As much of a gut punch as the trade deadline was, we do have to acknowledge that McCain simply had not been doing much for this year’s squad. He had scored fewer points on the season than Andre Drummond at the time he was traded.

While it sucks not to add anything, I think it’s fair to say that if you were optimistic on this year’s team heading into the deadline, you should still feel that way now. We can at least feel happy about the fact that the team has a 1.5 game cushion in between them and the play-in, and that we are just two months away from the playoffs with Embiid and George not having any season-ending injuries. The George suspension, while frustrating, does put the chances of him being fully healthy for the playoffs as close to 100% as humanly possible. We should (knock on wood) get to see the so-called big three have an actual shot in the playoffs.

The Sixers still have a net rating of +6.1 with those three guys on the court – the equivalent of a team with a win total in the high 50s. They are still a very good basketball team! And after how brutal last season was, I’ll be thrilled if we just get to see that team do battle in April.

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Mike O’Connor is the best O’Connor in basketball writing. Previously of The Athletic, you can find Mike on Twitter @MOConnor_NBA. Mike’s writing is brought to you by Body Bio, supplements based on science, focusing on your gut and brain health.

If you’ve paid close attention to the Sixers’ recent trade deadlines, they’ve all followed a similar strategy: shed salary, while still trying to win now.

In 2023, they traded Matisse Thybulle and a second round pick for Jalen McDaniels and two second round picks – a move that saved them a couple million dollars, while also getting a fringe rotational player at a position of need. In 2024, they gave up three second round picks for Buddy Hield, while also salary dumping Danuel House, Jr. and Jaden Springer. In 2025, they traded Caleb Martin for Quentin Grimes, while also salary dumping K.J. Martin.

So, if I had to guess, given their middling status in the standings and the evergreen uncertainty around their health, the Sixers’ 2026 trade deadline will look pretty similar to the previous three. It wouldn’t shock me at all to see some sort of a Kelly Oubre and/or Andre Drummond salary dump, while also making a move to acquire a young player on a cheap contract who could help them now. And as someone who has really enjoyed this Sixers season, I’m pretty OK with this team looking mostly similar after the deadline, even if I’d find a salary dump pretty aggravating.

Of course, it’s worth prepping for anything – at this time four years ago, the possibility of a Ben Simmons for James Harden trade felt like a pipe dream. Whether it’s taking a home-run swing to win now or an interesting opportunity to free up future cap space, I could be talked into anything if the price is right. So, here in this piece, I’ll propose some hypothetical trades, divided into a few distinct categories in terms of how or why the Sixers might consider them.

The “Do you like Quentin Grimes more than we like Quentin Grimes?” trades

In spite of recent struggles – Grimes is shooting just 42 percent from the floor since the first of December – I still consider myself an optimist on Grimes, and I would be happy to see him return on a long-term deal this summer. His quick trigger from 3, downhill speed off the dribble, and defensive versatility make him a net positive in almost any role. He is not the player that we saw towards the end of last year. He is also not as bad as he is playing right now.

With all that being said, it’s worth at least considering the fact that Grimes is an impending free agent — and given that negotiations last summer didn’t seem to go all that well, it’s entirely possible that the Sixers simply get outbid for Grimes by a team with cap space that views him as a starter-level player. The Sixers likely already know what they would be willing to offer Grimes this summer; if they suspect it won’t be the highest offer on the market, it makes a lot of sense to try to trade him.

Opportunities may be limited given that the acquiring team would not acquire his Bird rights and that he has a no-trade clause. But one destination that makes a lot of sense to me is Houston. The Rockets are extremely loaded at the forward positions, desperately need guard help, and have their own version of the Grimes predicament in Tari Eason, who they did not sign to a rookie extension last summer. On top of that, Grimes is from Houston and played his college ball there, as well.

The Rockets should have enough salary flexibility to offer Grimes up to the full MLE this summer ($15.1 million), while retaining the necessary salary flexibility to build out the rest of their roster. If they think that Grimes on a $15ish-million contract is better than Eason at the price he’s asking for (likely around $20 million), they very well might accept this offer:

Eason, 24, has struggled with health issues in each of the past three seasons, but is a ferocious rebounder and defender with a career 3-point percentage of 36.9%. He plays just 24 minutes per game for Houston due to their forward depth, but would undoubtedly start for the Sixers – he would round out an incredible defensive trio with Edgecombe and George, and while filling the Sixers’ rebounding need without sacrificing their offensive spacing. He is a considerably better rebounder than Dominick Barlow (12.8 rebounds per 100 possessions vs. 10.2), and unlike Barlow, is a reliable and willing 3-point shooter.

The Sixers will certainly have to pay north of $15 million per year to keep Eason after this season, but given the option between paying Grimes $13 million and Eason $18 million — and considering the layout of the Sixers’ roster — isn’t the choice there pretty obvious?

An alternative but similar-ish option to trading for Eason would be trading Grimes for the cheaper-this-season Nikola Jovic, who is having a down year in Miami, but is signed to a reasonable deal at around $15 million per year that kicks in starting next year. This deal would help the Sixers shed some precious luxury tax money for this year while helping to fill the power forward need for years to come. For the record: I think Eason is a much better player than Jovic, but trade value is roughly equal given that Jovic is already locked up on a reasonable long term deal.

A slightly less inspiring option would be sending Grimes to Indiana, who despite being deep at the guard position may look at Grimes’ speed and style of play and view him as a nice long-term fit despite the team not being competitive this season. In exchange, the Sixers would get an excellent stretch five option in Jay Huff and take a flier on Ben Sheppard, who could be interesting if the jump shot ever becomes average or better.

It might be a tougher sell to get Grimes to waive his no-trade clause to go to Indiana. And if you’re the Sixers, this move likely comes as part one in a larger series of moves. But the deal makes sense in the event that both of those things come to fruition.

Overall, I’d consider it pretty likely that Grimes is still here after the deadline, and I’d say the Sixers still have a good shot at retaining him long term – it’s not as if Grimes is playing his way out of their price range so far this season. But if the Sixers can manage to flip him for a player who fills more of a need and is easier to re-sign long term, they would be wise to do so.

The “this might be our only chance to trade Paul George” trades

All season long, I have consistently been positive on Paul George. His defensive impact is still world-class. If he qualified based on games played, I might advocate for him to make an All-Defense team. The Sixers are 4.3 points per 100 possessions better on defense when George is on the floor, he’s eighth in the league in deflections per game, and the film shows an obviously great defensive player.

With that being said, $52 million is a lot of money for a guy who does feel like a souped-up Robert Covington on most nights. George can still pop off for 30+ points every now and then like he did Tuesday night against Milwaukee,, but his overall scoring numbers are only narrowly better on a per-possession basis to last year’s, which are a far cry even from his final year in L.A. in 2024 (25.6 points per 100 vs. 33.0). In terms of volume and efficiency, George’s offense is not particularly close to what any reasonable person would consider to be star-level production.

With that in mind, I think you’d have to at least hear out whatever offers come in for George – and given that there are some desperate teams out there who could use a player like PG, it might be the Sixers’ one and only shot to get off of this contract without giving up assets.

The most obvious trade partner there is Golden State. With Jimmy Butler out for the season and likely most of next season, the Warriors’ only hope of salvaging what’s left of the Curry-Draymond-Kerr era is trading Butler for a high-level player. With Butler’s contract being a year shorter than George’s, the Sixers open up some flexibility in 2027 while recouping a pick swap in 2028 that could prove quite valuable.

Here’s a bit of a crazy one: Would the Lakers say yes to a LeBron for PG swap? George fits what they need far more than James does – he would clean up a lot of their off-ball defense issues while also being willing to just stand in the corner, watch Doncic dribble, and hoist up threes.

The Sixers would get a player whose offense is still considerably more impactful than George’s, and whose passing ability would free up tons of off-ball actions for Maxey – and of course, they would open up $30+ million in cap space for the off-season. I kind of like it!

My guess would be that the Lakers demand an asset attached to George in this hypothetical trade. It would also be highly unusual for a franchise like the Lakers to trade a player like LeBron in a deal as unsexy as this one, unless James outright requests it. But given that there’s a lot of drama around LeBron at the moment and that their defense is simply too porous as-is to make a real push in the playoffs, the ability to pair George with Doncic and Reaves for the next couple years without giving anything up does come with some appeal.

The only other type of George trade that might make sense in terms of getting off his salary is a team stuck in the middle that’s willing to take on some additional years of big money to potentially raise their ceiling. Miami makes sense there, given their ample tradeable salary, lack of draft assets, and never-ending play-in status. George certainly offers a level of steadiness and well-roundedness to his game that Wiggins simply does not.

Much like with Grimes, I do expect PG to remain on the Sixers past the deadline. But if teams come calling and it allows the Sixers to open up flexibility in the long run – while potentially getting an asset, as well – they’d have to listen.

The “it’s always a good idea to buy low on a young player” trades

The one type of trade that makes evergreen sense for a team like the Sixers is buying low on a young player that they feel is undervalued by their current team. Figure that the targets should be something slightly below the caliber of how we all perceived Quentin Grimes at this time last year. If the Sixers believe that there’s an undervalued young player out there on the market, it’s a good idea to spend whatever it takes to get them.

One such candidate would be Pelicans center Yves Missi, who had an excellent rookie season – even making Second Team All-Rookie – before seeing his minutes cut this season due to the addition of rookie Derik Queen.

Missi is your prototypical rim running center, but has a respectable handle for a big man and can finish plays off of short rolls. Think of him like a bigger, stronger, more-under-control version of Adem Bona. With Justin Edwards suffering a similar fate on this Sixers team – getting buried in the rotation behind ample depth after a solid rookie year – I wonder if an Edwards-plus-picks for Missi package makes sense.

While he’s still young and developing, I would feel quite confident handing the keys over to Missi right now as the Sixers’ primary backup center. Sneakily, one of the Sixers’ biggest issues over their last 15 games or so is that they are back to being absolutely horrendous with Joel Embiid off the floor. Per pbpstats.com, the Sixers are -5.5 points per 100 possessions without Embiid on the floor since December 30th. Earlier this year, their ability to stay afloat and win games with Embiid off the floor was a pleasant surprise, but it has since dropped off dramatically – in large part, I would argue, due to subpar play from their backup centers.

Another hypothetical buy-low opportunity on a young center would be Brooklyn’s Day’Ron Sharpe. Sharpe is a much different player from Missi – he’s a skilled, slightly more ground-bound center who has very good passing chops for a big man. He would open up the potential to operate as a passing hub for the second unit to allow the Sixers’ guards to run around and find openings off the ball.

With the number of games that Embiid misses, having a big man who can provide some legitimate structure to your offense would be extremely valuable. Sharpe is not the rim protector that Missi is, but the ability to carry some degree of an offensive load is a rare skill for a backup center.

Here’s a bit of a crazier idea: even though he is out for the year, would the Sixers consider a Jared McCain for Dereck Lively 1-for-1 challenge trade?

Lively and McCain have both seen their stock decline since their respective rookie years, and it would be a huge gamble for both teams. But the Sixers have a glut of young guards and the Mavs have a glut of big men – if the Sixers have completely soured on McCain and they don’t expect him to contribute much this year anyway, the trade would make some sense for them.

If the Sixers feel confident in Adem Bona’s ability to hold down the fort as backup center for years to come (a sentiment I do not share – the defensive IQ is just not there), perhaps buying low on a young guard or forward would make more sense. One such player that I’ve long had a soft spot for is Wizards guard AJ Johnson: a hyper-athletic guard in his third season whose primary issue is his shaky jump shot – he’s shooting just 26 percent from deep for his career. Stylistically and skill-set wise, he reminds me a bit of (gulp) Timothé Luwawu-Cabarrot.

One of the additional benefits of trading with the Wizards is that they have ample cap space to be able to take on salary. I would obviously prefer that they don’t do this, but if the Sixers are hellbent on shedding the luxury tax, one way to make that slightly less painful would be netting back an interesting, 21-year-old, 6-foot-5 guard.

The “It’s Giannis” trade

In case you missed it, Giannis Antetokounmpo has sorta-kinda demanded a trade from the Milwaukee Bucks. Giannis is 31 years old and has two years remaining on his contract, plus a player option for 2027-28. The Sixers have not been mentioned by any major reporter as a legitimate suitor, but last week, Bill Simmons went semi-viral for suggesting a Giannis-to-Philly trade involving V.J. Edgecombe. Here was the exact deal he proposed:

The reaction from Sixers fans was overwhelmingly negative; in all the replies and comment sections, I don’t think I’ve actually seen a single Sixers fan say that they would do this. The vast majority of fans would rather have 9+ years of V.J. Edgecombe than potentially only a few years of Giannis, especially given the uncertainty of Embiid’s (and now Giannis’) health.

I get all that. I don’t think it’s crazy to say no to this, especially factoring in the sentimental value of having Edgecombe and the emotional upheaval that would come with suddenly rooting for Giannis. All that being said, I want to at least walk through why it warrants consideration. Don’t get mad – just hear me out!

I can’t help but wonder if we are all thinking with a bit too much sentimentality and ignoring A) how good Giannis actually is, and B) just how much sense this makes for the Sixers. This trade immediately makes the Sixers legitimate title contenders and also cleans up the “two timelines” problem that figures to be a point of tension for them for years to come. The Sixers suddenly go from a middling team plagued by the question of how they can try to win with Embiid and PG while not ruining the future for Edgecombe’s prime, to a team that can immediately win-now and has an obvious logical end-point for when they should pivot to a rebuild; they can go for broke for the next few years, and then trade Maxey and tank whenever Giannis and Embiid age out of relevance.

In all of the madness around the Bucks over the past few years, I think Giannis has somehow become underrated. He is a top-20 player of all time, still in his prime – and let’s be clear, he is very much still in his prime. Despite a horrendous supporting cast, Giannis is putting up a career-best 46.8 points per 100 possessions on a career-best 68 percent true shooting. The Bucks also have the equivalent of the league’s best offense when he is on the floor!

Giannis has not finished outside the top seven in MVP voting in 10 years. He is a walking, one-man 48 win season – you could give him the worst supporting cast imaginable, and your win total would still be somewhere in the high 40s if he is healthy. Even if Embiid’s health goes south immediately, I still think the team is a top-four seed in the East with the potential to beat anyone. Also worth noting: Giannis is constantly in the mix for All-Defense teams and is also one of the best rebounders in the league. He actively clears up some of the Sixers’ biggest weaknesses.

If you add Giannis, your immediate starting lineup would become Maxey-Grimes-Oubre-Giannis-Embiid. The knowledge that they’re locked into trying to win now would also free up the Sixers to shell out 1-2 other first round picks to round out their rotation with at least one other starter-quality player – could they trade the Clippers pick-plus-salary for Herb Jones? Then throw a couple seconds the Pacers’ way for Jay Huff? Regardless, the point is that the Sixers would have a kick-ass starting point with the potential to still add to it.

Going back to the original point, I don’t think it’s even fair to say that the Sixers have a “two timelines” thing happening right now. They have one blue-chip young player in Edgecombe. Maxey is five years older than Edgecombe; he is in his prime – perhaps at his absolute peak – right now. Quentin Grimes is the same age as Maxey, and is an impending free agent. Jared McCain’s career is no longer a surefire success. Justin Edwards and Adem Bona are fringe rotation players. They have one truly promising player under the age of 25, and given that they aren’t tanking and don’t have a surplus of draft capital, they don’t have many avenues to add another.

One last vital aspect to this, which is somewhat uncomfortable to acknowledge: starting in the 2029-2030 season, Maxey (assuming he’s even still at the level he is now) will be eligible for a supermax contract. I love Tyrese, and I’ve always been one of his strongest supporters, so I say this lovingly – I’m not sure you can win anything with a player like him making $65+ million per year. A huge part of the dilemma of supposedly building around a Maxey-Edgecombe backcourt is the fact that by the time the Sixers have Embiid and George off the books, they will have that Maxey extension looming around the corner. How do you add young-ish, blue-chip talent that fits the Maxey-Edgecombe timeline without any impending cap space, surplus of draft picks, or plan to bottom out and tank?

It would be one hell of a gamble, but I think you’re kidding yourself if you can’t see how much logical sense it makes. The ease with which the entire timeline fits together is pretty appealing to me – you are immediately a contender and you don’t have to worry about splitting the baby in terms of your future.

I dunno, man. It’s Giannis! I think we would all get over the pain of losing Edgecombe if Giannis leads the Sixers to a deep playoff run(s). The two-man game with him and Maxey would be electric – Maxey, unlike Damian Lillard, has always shown a willingness and ability to play without the ball and establish synergy in pick and rolls and dribble hand-offs. Embiid, whatever you think of his future health prospects, can still fill in the scoring gaps and protect the rim at a high level – something that will only be complemented by Giannis.

I think I would do it, guys. I doubt the Sixers will – they seem to really love Edgecombe as an organization, and the overall vibes in the locker room seem to be great. And for me personally, I would not be at all sad to stick with V.J. and miss out on Giannis – like I said, I love this Sixers team! But the fact remains that by all current indicators, this team is merely pretty good, and they are likely to stay that way for the foreseeable future. The very thing that got me roped into The Process was the idea of escaping the middle and contending for a title, and this trade may be their last shot at doing so for a long, long time.

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Mike O’Connor is the best O’Connor in basketball writing. Previously of The Athletic, you can find Mike on Twitter @MOConnor_NBA. Mike’s writing is brought to you by Body Bio, supplements based on science, focusing on your gut and brain health.

I think often about the game that Joel Embiid played against the Brooklyn Nets on February 22, 2025 – his last game of the 2024-25 season. It was the final of five games in which Embiid had returned from injury during the month of February; his last attempt at giving it a go that season despite his chronic left knee issues.

As was the case in each of his previous stretches of games, Embiid’s health had visibly declined over the past several games. Whenever he returned from a long layoff that season, he looked OK initially – not like himself, but still a high-level player. But by the end of each stint, especially the last one, he looked like a complete shell of himself. He could hardly get up and down the floor. He went 4-13 from the floor for 14 points in 31 minutes during that Nets game, and was a -7 in a game the Sixers lost by two. Visibly, it was the worst I’d ever seen him look on a basketball court.

And given the level of pessimism that I had about Embiid’s long-term health after that game, I think any evaluation of Embiid’s level of play this season needs to start by providing that context. According to the overwhelming majority of NBA fans and pundits, this guy’s career was over a year ago – hell, many were still saying it was over a month ago, and they weren’t crazy to feel that way. But now, he is back on the court regularly, playing at an incredibly high level, and has yet to miss a single game this year due to left knee soreness – so far, he has only missed games due to rest, illness and right knee soreness. After Monday’s win over the Raptors, Embiid surpassed his total in games played (19) from last year.

Yes, he has declined considerably from his peak, and yes, his knee issues are chronic and could re-emerge at any moment. But just for now, I would argue we have already seen enough to call this one of the best stories in the NBA this season. This type of thing simply does not happen – once big men start having major chronic knee issues for over a year, things rarely get better. The NBA no longer has a Comeback Player of the Year award (nor would Embiid qualify for it due to the 65-game rule), but if there was such a thing, he would be the favorite for it right now.

Of course, given that his season has been somewhat up-and-down, plus the fact that he’s only played 20 games, it’s hard to put a definitive label on exactly how good Embiid is right now. But for my money: when he’s on the floor, Embiid is a no-brainer top-30 player right now. Take a look at the Ringer’s NBA top 100 – Bam Adebayo and Austin Reaves are 30th and 31st currently. You’d have a hard time convincing me that the impact levels of those two guys are on the same level as Embiid’s when he’s on the floor.

As I posted on Twitter Monday night, Embiid’s per-minute stats are nearly identical to those of prime DeMarcus Cousins. Embiid, of course, had an iffy start to the season defensively, but has generally been a better defensive player than Cousins was, even at his peak.

Perhaps the most encouraging indicator for Embiid’s scoring output is the fact that his efficiency on two-pointers is back to where it was at his peak – 55 percent this year, versus 56 percent in 2023-24. To be fair, it’s on a lower volume, and a far higher percentage of them are being assisted on (59 percent vs. 53 percent). Additionally, his at-rim percentages are still well below his peak (80 percent in 2023 vs. 64 percent this year). But his overall two-point percentage dipped all the way down to 49 percent last season. The fact that it’s hiked back up is extremely encouraging. He is back to creating efficient offense with bully-ball post-ups and self-creation out of short rolls – two of his bread-and-butter plays, and two of the things that this team needs the most from him offensively.

Speaking of short rolls, Embiid’s ability to make plays out of those situations has been one of the areas where he has improved the most from the start of this season, and it has paid major dividends for the Embiid-Maxey two-man game.

If you caught yourself feeling like their two man game hadn’t quite had the same synergy earlier this season, you weren’t wrong. In ‘23-24, defenses were guarding their two-man game much differently. At that time, the primary concern defenses had was keeping the ball out of Embiid’s hands as a roller. As such, teams generally defended their pick and rolls with some form of a drop coverage on Maxey. If that meant giving up pull-up 3s for Maxey, so be it. They did not want Embiid catching the ball in wide open space with room to either pull up in the mid-range or drive to the rim. Here’s a screen grab from a 10/28/23 game against the Raptors:

This season, teams have been showing much higher on these screens. Defenses have decided that if Maxey hits Embiid with a pocket pass 23 feet from the rim, they don’t care. They know that Embiid is not the driver that he once was, and that he has lacked both the ability and perhaps the stamina to take off with the ball 10-15 times per game in these situations.

Naturally, the onus was on Embiid to force teams out of this coverage; he had to prove to them that giving him an open driving lane from 22 feet was mathematically not worth it.

And over the course of the past couple weeks, he’s done that. The best example of this was the December 30th win over Memphis – the Grizzlies came out in this high coverage, and Embiid started to use the open space to create shots for himself:

And finally, later on in the game, Memphis finally relented and went back to a drop coverage. That allowed for Embiid and Maxey to connect on the types of pocket passes that made their two-man game so beautiful in 2023-24.

Since then, Embiid has only continued to torch the higher coverages on Maxey. Any time a big man shows too high or lingers too long on Maxey, Embiid is able to use the space and positioning it grants him to create easy offense.

This will continue to be an X’s and O’s battle to watch as the season goes on. If I’m an opposing coach, I likely would continue to show high on Maxey’s screens and force Embiid to create tons of offense by himself in order to beat me. But if he continues to decimate this coverage, you’ll see more drops, which will open up pull-up 3s for Maxey and pocket passes at 12-15 feet for Embiid. But either way, we are back to a “pick your poison” scenario for opposing teams – and a particularly deadly one – which was not the case last year and earlier this year.

To be fair, there are still certain areas where Embiid is a far cry from what he was at his peak. His 3-point percentage is all the way down to 23 percent, a distant margin from his career average of 33.4 percent. The shooting numbers should course-correct over time, though.

The area that is of more concern is Jo’s defense. The Sixers are still narrowly better defensively with Embiid on the floor (-2.2 per 100 possessions, per Cleaning The Glass), but they are getting absolutely crushed in their transition defense with Embiid on the floor.

Per CTG, with Embiid off the floor, the Sixers have the equivalent of the 3rd best transition defense in the NBA. With Embiid on the floor, they have the worst transition defense in the league by a mile. What’s worse, most of that damage is coming off of live rebounds – opponents are scoring a ghastly 143.5 points per 100 possessions when they push the ball off of rebounds with Embiid on the floor. I can’t even put that into proper context – just know it’s unfathomably bad.

This of course is caused by several things. For starters, any time your offense is run through a post-up heavy big man, your transition defense will likely be worse. Secondly, Embiid’s loss of top-end sprint speed allows opposing bigs to just beat him running down the floor. And lastly, Embiid’s increasing reliance on foul-baiting leads to a lot of possessions ending with him on the ground, leading to easy transition opportunities.

The Sixers can only hope that Embiid’s overall mobility and stamina continue to increase and that he’s able to recover better in transition. And again, to be fair, they are better overall defensively with him on the floor – especially when it comes to protecting the rim, where opponents shoot 6.5 percent worse with Embiid on the floor. But if this flaw remains as glaring as it is now, the wrong matchup in the playoffs could turn this into a disaster for the Sixers. It’s something they will have to monitor and improve as the season progresses.

Overall, Embiid’s current combination of strengths and weaknesses was what prompted me to look up the Boogie Cousins comparison in the first place – Joel still puts up elite offensive numbers, but the decline in defensive impact puts him into a category of offense-first big men of the Cousins ilk. Still, that’s not a bad place to be; Cousins made two All-NBA teams! Not many players can say that they’ve declined their way post-injuries into being a Cousins-level player.

Claiming to know what the future holds for Embiid would be dishonest. His health could continue to improve, or it could deteriorate in an instant – who knows. But right now, I have to say I’m thrilled both as a Sixers fan and for him personally that he’s been able to reach this level again. Embiid is back to playing at a level that I never thought I’d see from him again. If he’d had enough games played, he’d be a no-brainer All-Star – his numbers, combined with the team’s success and superior play with him on the floor justify that easily.

Right now, at this exact moment, with him healthy, I don’t think there are 25 basketball players in the world better than him. He’s fitting in well to a team that no longer needs him to be the sun, the moon, and the stars on either end. Things are clicking well for this Sixers team, and if the playoffs started today, I’d be scared to play against them.

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Mike O’Connor is the best O’Connor in basketball writing. Previously of The Athletic, you can find Mike on Twitter @MOConnor_NBA. Mike’s writing is brought to you by Body Bio, supplements based on science, focusing on your gut and brain health.

One of the many disappointing aspects of The Process was that the Sixers never gave us a certain type of season that ascending teams coming out of a rebuild often do – that is, the “lots of hope with zero expectations” season.

Coming off of a tanking season in 2016-17, the 2017-18 roster was set up perfectly to deliver us that type of year, but the Markelle Fultz weirdness combined with their 16-game win streak that suddenly escalated them into contender status nullified whatever chance we had at those types of vibes. The Sixers went from having the No. 1 pick in the draft to “...wait, are they the favorites to come out of the East?” within nine months. There was no honeymoon phase with a young team before they became saddled with heavy expectations.

The reason I say all of this is because I believe we are somehow finally getting that type of season now. It’s eight years late and clearly out of order – it’s not as if everyone expects a guaranteed leap to contender status next year – but regardless, we now have the type of fun, worry-free season that was promised.

The Sixers are 16-11. If they take care of the Nets on Tuesday, they’ll be 17-11 heading into Christmas. That is a 50 win pace. They are somewhere in between good and really good. They have one of the 10 best players in the league, an absolute stud of a rookie, and a handful of other interesting players under the age of 25. They have a concrete identity and they play hard as hell.

They’ve also got two former superstar veterans on max contracts who, despite playing less than half of their games, have fit in quite nicely to the team’s overall identity and have not cast any major shadow over the team with their repeated absences. We have yet to see the team at full strength, but the flashes we’ve seen from Joel Embiid and Paul George combined with the team’s performance without them could lead a reasonable person to wonder if the Sixers could actually make a deep playoff run, if those two guys somehow manage to stay healthy etc. etc.

Regardless, it’s a delightful combination as a fan – tangible success now, with obvious reasons to daydream about both the short- and long-term future. On any given night, you can find something else to enjoy. One night, you’re watching a throwback Joel Embiid performance. Another night, you’re asking yourself if V.J. Edgecombe is going to make 10 All-Star teams. Other times, you’re left to wonder how many healthy teammates Tyrese Maxey would actually need to carry this team to the Conference Finals. And all the while, you just can’t believe Dominick Barlow is still on a two-way contract.

The other crucial aspect of the Sixers’ enjoyability this season, at least for me personally, is that I genuinely enjoy watching all of these guys play ball. For many years, even if I didn’t outright hate them, there were certain aspects of the Ben Simmons and James Harden experiences that I just couldn’t bring myself to enjoy. The sheer insanity of Simmons refusing to shoot plus the monotonous nature of Harden’s style of play just left me mildly annoyed with them at all times, even if the team was awesome while they were on it. Longtime readers will also recall that I absolutely could not stand watching Tobias Harris, and that Al Horford is my least favorite Sixer of all time. It’s hard to overstate what a drag it is as a fan having to tune in to watch players – especially Tobias, given how long he was here and how quickly we soured on him – that you just viscerally cannot stand watching.

And so, having a legitimately good team with a roster full of players I genuinely like is incredibly refreshing for me. I don’t mean to be overdramatic – I have of course enjoyed many Sixers seasons, especially 2018-19 and 2022-23 – but for basically 15 years, the Sixers have either A) been terrible, or B) featured some of my least favorite players of all time.

With this year’s roster, I just love watching every individual player’s game. Embiid, whatever his faults, is still a majestic player with incredible IQ and talent. Paul George, despite being past his prime, is still incredibly smooth and is somehow always in the right place on defense. Andre Drummond’s occasional mishaps are more charming than annoying. Truly, what is the most annoying quality that any 2025-26 Sixer has? Quentin Grimes throws a bad pass every once in a while? Compared to the torture of watching Tobias pass up wide open 3s and play despicably bad off-ball defense, I’ll happily live with Grimes’ brain farts.

Even the guys on the fringe of the rotation have added some real charm to the team. Jabari Walker grabs rebounds with a level of enthusiasm that I haven’t seen in any Sixer since Reggie Evans. Adem Bona blocks shots with such an intensity that each one has the chance to change the momentum of the game. Justin Edwards manages to do next to nothing wrong in his limited minutes. I can’t believe I’m saying this, but even Kyle Lowry has looked pretty good in his short stints. The Sixers are +8.2 per 100 possessions with Uncle Lowry on the floor!

I have no idea how this season will end, or if the good vibes will even last the whole year. There are also some difficult questions that need to be asked in terms of potential trades if Embiid continues to miss tons of games and the team continues to win without him on the floor. They might be good enough to where an Embiid trade at the deadline just makes too much logical sense. It also remains unclear whether McCain and Grimes can or should coexist with the Maxey-Edgecombe backcourt. As much fun as I’m having at the moment, the roster could look very, very different in 12 months.

But for now? I’m just going to soak it all in. The Sixers are both good and fun. I like every single player on the team. They are giving us a season of very competent basketball, with potential to be even more at full health – all with zero weight of expectations. Regardless of what the long term future holds for the team’s veterans, the Sixers have a foundation of Tyrese Maxey, V.J. Edgecombe and plenty of future draft capital. If they play their cards right, they can continue to forge their identity while remaining good enough to be in the mix in the Eastern Conference every year. I’m as bullish on the team’s long term future as I’ve been since the first couple years of the Embiid era, all while thoroughly enjoying the current state of the team. As Harrison Bader would say, what a gift.

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Mike O’Connor is the best O’Connor in basketball writing. Previously of The Athletic, you can find Mike on Twitter @MOConnor_NBA. Mike’s writing is brought to you by Body Bio, supplements based on science, focusing on your gut and brain health.

The most important question that every serious NBA team needs to answer for themselves is the following: when are you trying to win? Now? In two years? In seven years?

It’s the question that the Sixers couldn’t answer from the post-Iverson, pre-process days. There was no hope of winning then, and no plan for winning later. It’s the question they tried to answer by trading Jrue Holiday and entering into a deep rebuild in 2013. Julius Erving, back in 2015, claimed he was told at the time by Sixers’ ownership that The Process was a seven year plan. And, remarkably, he wasn’t far off – the first year that one could argue that the Sixers legitimately could have won the title was 2018-19, six seasons after the Holiday trade.

Surely, when the Sixers signed Paul George and extended Joel Embiid in the summer of 2024, the plan was to win now. But things have changed dramatically since then – Embiid has been constantly injured and has considerably declined, as has George, to a lesser extent on both accounts. The team has also nailed two consecutive first round draft picks in Jared McCain and V.J. Edgecombe, who each have the potential to be franchise cornerstones in the future. They stole Quentin Grimes from the Mavericks. They’ve also made a few excellent fringe signings of young players, including Dominick Barlow, Justin Edwards and Trendon Watford.

But perhaps the biggest change of all is the ascendance of Tyrese Maxey. Coming into last season, almost no one would have had Maxey as a top-15 player. Now, he might just have the inside track at a spot on First Team All-NBA. His stats are outpacing the likes of Donovan Mitchell, Jalen Brunson, and Anthony Edwards. Statistically and stylistically, he looks quite similar to peak Damian Lillard. Here are Maxey’s stats this year compared to Dame’s in 2022-23 – likely the best of Lillard’s career.

So, if you’d been told 14 months ago that George and Embiid would soon become shells of their former selves, the logical conclusion would have been for the Sixers to accept their fate and enter into another rebuild. But now, after the ascendance of Maxey and the acquisition of other young talent, the question becomes far more complicated.

They have a legitimate top-12 player at age 25, with enough of a supporting cast and pool of assets that you’d have to wonder what it’d look like to try to win now – or at least within the next few years. It’s also worth noting that the league is in a different place than past eras, where depth and identity matters more than ever. We live in a world where Tyrese Haliburton just led a team to the Finals – it’s not Steph and/or K.D. versus LeBron for the title every year where, if you don’t have one of those guys, you shouldn’t even bother trying.

Here in this piece, I’ll go through a few different possibilities for how the Sixers can proceed with building around Maxey. For clarity sake, I’m going in order of what I think is most likely for the Sixers to do.

Stay the course this season while planning to open up flexibility in the off-season

I view the most likely outcome here being that the Sixers will keep both George and Embiid on the roster this season, and simply hope that they are able to stay healthy for the playoffs. I don’t think that Daryl Morey would be all that enthused about the idea of giving up one or multiple draft picks to get off of Embiid (which is undoubtedly what it would take), in order to take back another player on a huge contract that is less talented than Embiid.

An example of a move like that would be something in the realm of Embiid and 2-3 first round picks for a player like Domantas Sabonis. Would it make the Sixers better this season? Yes. Would it give them more of a concrete identity? Yes. But at the end of the day, you are giving up draft picks in a deal that locks you into your current core and doesn’t get you into the inner circle of contenders. Your short-term title odds, while higher, are still capped pretty low, your pool of blue-chip assets is diminished, and you’ve opened up no long-term flexibility.

Instead, if Embiid continues to miss tons of games and the team misses the playoffs or loses in the first round, I could foresee a scenario this summer in which they salary dump George and waive and stretch Embiid in order to open up cap space to go out and sign free agents. If they were able to fully dump George (possible, but unlikely) and then stretch Embiid’s contract, they could have up to $70 million in cap space heading into the summer. A much more likely scenario would be taking back a smaller contract for George – let’s say, Jerami Grant’s $35 million deal – in some sort of three team deal that opens up $35 million in cap space, when combined with stretching Embiid.

In that event, you’ve just reshuffled the deck without giving up any major draft assets. Embiid and George are gone, and they’d go into 2026-27 with their current core of young players, Grant, and the ability to add $35 million in free agents. That’s not a bad spot to be in!

This path, despite not being the most expedient, does re-align the Sixers’ timeline around Maxey without completely mortgaging their long term future. Getting to title contention from here would still be a delicate task, but in freeing themselves from the George and Embiid contracts, it gives them enough flexibility to get there if they can nail a couple big decisions. And, most importantly, by not trading any of their future draft picks, they have all the freedom in the world to lengthen their timeline if their attempts to win in the short term wind up failing.

Keep George and Embiid on the roster while hoping to string together small wins for 3-4 years

In the event that Morey refuses to give up draft assets to get off of George and/or Embiid, and Josh Harris refuses to eat the money required to stretch one of both of them, the Sixers would of course be stuck with both aging stars through the 2028 and 2029 seasons, respectively.

Needless to say, I find this to be the most difficult path imaginable for building a title contender around Maxey. That is in large part because of the fact that once Embiid’s deal expires in 2029, the Sixers will then be on the hook for extensions for both Maxey and Edgecombe. McCain, if he’s still around, would have kicked in a year earlier.

Maxey, barring consecutive years of injury and/or regression, should make an All-NBA team at some point, and thus, be in line for a super-max deal. Edgecombe, if he becomes the player we all expect him to be, would be in line for a regular max deal. There goes 60 percent of the salary cap right there, just with those two guys.

This scenario would hopefully involve quality draft picks coming in from the Clippers in 2028 and 2029, but those are obviously far from guaranteed hits. Filling out the rest of the roster with 40 percent of the cap would be an incredibly difficult task, unless Maxey and Edgecombe are both top-15 players at that point.

I’m not discounting the possibility that they could string together some helpful moves and successful draft picks over the next four years, but they would realistically have to pull off 2-3 more Quentin Grimes-esque trades and 1-2 more Jared McCain-level draft steals in order to be title contenders in the 2029-30 season. It’s just that hard to build contenders around two max players in the second apron era. There is a reason that contending teams in recent years – the Celtics, Pacers, Thunder, and Nuggets — all made it to the Finals before their best player was on a supermax. Depth matters more than ever. Once you have to start shedding salary to pay your top guy $60 million, it’s practically impossible to have sustained title contention.

In the past, this is sort of the path that Daryl Morey has chosen to take – he doesn’t like to give up picks to undo bad contracts, and he rarely bottoms out to set himself up for the future. When Tracy McGrady and Yao Ming started losing their careers due to injury in the late 2000s, Morey never decided to tank, opting instead to string together a bunch of small victories before eventually trading for James Harden.

That might be the path he chooses here, but the landscape of the league in the second apron era makes things far more difficult. You run the risk of ending up like Lillard’s Blazers – they made one fluky Conference Finals appearance, and once that supermax contract kicked in, it was simply impossible to build a winning team around him.

In summary: waiting out the Embiid and George contracts makes winning with Maxey an awful lot harder. You are basically punting on the best years of his prime and hoping that you’ll be able to win when his contract takes up 35 percent of the cap. It’s a huge, long gamble that depends entirely on them stringing along high-quality wins on the margins for multiple consecutive years – either that, or a prayer that Embiid and George will find new life in their mid-late thirties to help Maxey make deep playoff runs.

Trade Embiid at the deadline in a win-now move; worry about George later

This path would certainly end up being the most satisfying choice in the short term. I mentioned the possibility of trading for Domantas Sabonis earlier – even though he is nowhere near the player that prime Embiid was, he is extremely durable, he fits their current identity, and he would likely make their supporting cast good enough to give Maxey a shot to carry them to a Conference Finals appearance. You can sub out McCain for two more first-round picks here, if you like.

Sabonis is far from the only option. There figures to be a plethora of max contract players available on the trade market this year – Zach LaVine, Zion Williamson, Anthony Davis, Giannis, etc. I’m not expecting the Sixers to trade Embiid for one of those guys, but could they hop into a trade as a third team in order to dump his deal? Or, could they pluck at the remnants of one of those teams after they trade their star? Would the Bucks accept Embiid and the Clippers pick for Myles Turner and Kyle Kuzma? It’s yucky, I know, but if you’d like to get off Embiid, you’re going to have to give something up and take something not-so-great back.

Splitting Embiid into multiple bad-ish contracts is likely the best option for getting off of him in the short term. Some of these may hurt your soul, but we’ve got to be realistic about where Embiid’s value is.

The Brooklyn Nets are perhaps the most logical partner for that type of a trade. They are in the midst of a deep rebuild and have plenty of room on their books to take on Embiid’s contract, and they also have multiple overpaid but competent role players whose salary adds up neatly to Embiid’s. Again – this would suck. But barring a miraculous turnaround for Embiid’s health, it would help the Sixers both short and long term.

Here’s a bit of a crazy one, which probably carries the most value in terms of winning now: would it be worth giving the Clippers their picks back if they swap Embiid for Kawhi Leonard? Leonard has just two years left on his deal, and his familiarity with Nick Nurse and Paul George might be attractive to him. Let me know which team says no to this three-teamer.

As much as all of these trades would hurt, they more than likely give the Sixers a better chance of winning now, while also clearing their books down the line. They would retain most of their picks while still putting themselves in a position to have cap space in 2028 before Maxey, McCain and Edgecombe’s extensions kick in.

As for the ceiling of any iterations of these teams, I’d say the Kawhi trade and the Sabonis trade both would give this team an outside chance at winning the East – with the former depending largely on health.

If they do decide to cut bait with Embiid in an effort to win now, keeping George around for the short term makes the most sense. He fits with any iteration of this roster, and he isn’t netting much positive value, if any, in a trade. It likely becomes much easier for the Sixers to get off of his deal in a year or two, if they so choose.

In any event, trading Embiid for another distressed asset may very well be the best option out of any of these three paths. Are you winning the title with a Maxey-Sabonis-George trio? Probably not. But it raises their chances while cutting out the long-term downside of Embiid’s deal. Would Kawhi be a nightmare to deal with, in many similar ways to Embiid? Yes, but he’s a better player right now, and his contract expires after next season. Are Claxton and MPJ getting this team beyond the No. 4 seed? I doubt it. But they’d be available often enough, with enough competence to give Maxey a shot at a carry job.

The other option, which would likely come with the highest premium, would involve basically punting on this season in order to trade Embiid and George to a tanking team with expiring contracts, like the Washington Wizards. As much as this trade would suck, it would open up $70-plus million in cap space, as I outlined earlier, thus allowing them to clear the books and build fresh around Maxey and Edgecombe.

I know – all of these trades suck. But this would set them up to wipe away all their mistakes from the summer of 2024 and start fresh. The ability to potentially add two max-level players to Maxey and Edgecombe is pretty enticing to think about.

Overall, I think a Sabonis-type trade is the most likely out of all of these. I don’t think the Sixers have an appetite for another mini-rebuild. And as I mentioned above, the most likely path out of all is that they play things out for this season and re-evaluate in the off-season. If things continue along the current trend with Embiid, I would be stunned if he’s still on the team in 14 months. It is too much of a distraction, and his current level of play does not warrant the drama that he comes with. I’d have to think the team would entertain ways to get off of him and start to build completely around Maxey.

None of these trades – hell, none of these three paths – make me feel great inside. It’s going to take a lot of foresight and lots of small wins by Daryl Morey and co. to turn the Sixers into a title contender built around Maxey. But the one thing I now feel confident about after his start to the season is that Maxey is capable of leading a contending team. Between what we saw from the Pacers and Haliburton last spring, plus Maxey’s ascendance this year, I do think he could lead a team to The Finals, if the front office is able to pull off enough Hail Marys to give him the right supporting cast.

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Mike O’Connor is the best O’Connor in basketball writing. Previously of The Athletic, you can find Mike on Twitter @MOConnor_NBA. Mike’s writing is brought to you by Body Bio, supplements based on science, focusing on your gut and brain health.

The Sixers are 9-7, and while that’s not some earth-shattering record, it’s surprisingly easy to feel good about where they’re at, especially given the injuries they’ve dealt with. If I had told you six weeks ago that the Sixers would start the season 9-7 with fewer than 300 combined minutes from Joel Embiid, Paul George, and Jared McCain, would you have been satisfied with that?

I think most Sixers fans would have. It has taken us 12 years to get here, and the Sixers can still prove that their ceiling is higher than this — but as Spike and Mike said on the pod last week, I think it’s fair to say that we’re all coming around to appreciate a team that is just… pretty good!

The Sixers are a mostly young, mostly competent basketball team, with some annoying quirks but lots of charm. Nearly 20 percent of the way through the season, we can say at the very least that this team is a fun nightly hang, with the upside to become something more. With that in mind, let’s get into some key takeaways from the Sixers’ 9-7 start.

Tyrese Maxey has been insanely good… and can be even better

I just keep running out of compliments to give to Tyrese Maxey. I repeatedly find myself watching these games and saying to myself, “I just can’t believe he’s this good.”

The show that he put on in Milwaukee on Thursday night – 54 points, nine assists, five rebounds, three steals, and three blocks in an overtime win – was likely the best game I’ve ever seen him play. I don’t say this lightly: It reminds me of the feeling I got watching Embiid 4-5 years ago where you started to notice that he has mastered the offensive end of the basketball court.

Maxey can do absolutely everything. He can drive and finish with either hand (he set a season record for most layups made with his off-hand in one game!). He’s got a lethal step-back 3, a crazy first step off the dribble, and a crafty midrange bag. He can fly around screens or run sideways into catch and shoot 3s. He can throw almost every pass in the book. He simultaneously feels in control, never sped up, and also faster than everyone else. He’s incredible. We are nearly 20 percent of the way through the season, and he is fifth in MVP odds on DraftKings. And deservedly so!

With that being said, I still feel there is room for improvement with Maxey,, specifically in terms of how Nick Nurse uses him. Just because he can do everything doesn’t mean that the Sixers shouldn’t try to structure the offense to tilt towards his biggest strengths.

If you look at the stretches of games where Maxey struggles and the offense sputters, it’s almost always because Nurse has turned the offense into Maxey isolating from 30 feet out like he’s James Harden. While he can do that for stretches, that is simply not the best way to use him, and the numbers back that up.

As of the weekend, Maxey was 12th in the league in isolation possessions per game, but his efficiency there was pretty dreadful – just 0.66 points per possession. For context, that was fifth on the Sixers alone. Maxey was also among the league leaders in pick and rolls per game, but with far-from-elite efficiency in those situations, averaging just 0.91 points per possession.

Contrarily, Maxey had been absolutely elite in dribble hand-offs, generating 1.39 PPP out of those situations — and ridiculously good (1.54 PPP) when coming off of off-ball screens. He was also in the elite tier of spot-up threats, generating 1.23 PPP in those situations.

So, while it’s a small sample size, the stats show an obvious trend, which we already somewhat knew. Maxey is one of the best in the world at working with a dribble hand-off partner to generate good looks. He can develop chemistry in a heartbeat with everyone from Joel Embiid to Trendon Watford. He is also one of the best off-ball shooting threats in the entire league, both in spot-up and off-screen situations. But when you ask him to be primarily a pick and roll and isolation threat, his efficiency isn’t among the best in the league. Can he do it? Yes. Is it the best use of him? No.

Knowing that, my plea to Nick Nurse would be to use Maxey a little more like Steph Curry and less like James Harden. I realize that this runs contrary to what Nurse is inclined to do, and Maxey’s raw numbers are great as they are, but knowing what we know about Maxey’s strengths and how they show up in the efficiency stats, the Sixers would be foolish not to tap into that side of Maxey even more. He has been one of the best offensive players in the league so far this season, and he can be even better.

The Regulars^TM are going to be a .500ish team

Part of the challenge of watching this Sixers team is going to be recalibrating your expectations depending on what the injury report says on a nightly basis. Of course, you’d be reasonable to expect a full strength Sixers team to win 65 percent of their games and beat the brakes off of bad teams. But those are going to be special occasions. You have to accept that most nights, you’re going to be watching The Regulars – the four guards plus role players – fighting like hell to skate by a mediocre opponent.

That of course is not a condemnation or complaint about The Regulars. I really am enjoying the viewing experience so far! They are 4-3 in games without both George and Embiid, and you’d be reasonable to expect that pace to continue. But I would just caution any Sixers fan who is unconsciously stuck in the title-or-bust mindset of three years ago – these are different times. There are no more automatic wins. No more blowouts where the starters rest in the fourth quarter. Most nights, you’re going to be watching a team that would lose roughly half of its games if stretched over the course of a full season.

Now, with all of that being said, I think you’d have to feel pretty good about the fact that the Sixers’ roster can win half of their games with $110 million on the bench. If The Regulars are able to hold onto their .500ish win pace, this team is without a doubt going to make the playoffs. Adding George and Embiid to this team – even the current versions of those two guys – is pretty exciting to think about. I’ll wait until we see it for a week or two before I start daydreaming about what a playoff run might look like, but based on what we’ve seen from George and Embiid in the stretches that they’ve been healthy this year? Yeah, I think this team could do some real damage if by some miracle they both stayed healthy for April and May.

Andre Drummond has been the unsung hero

I just wanted to give a quick tip of the cap to Andre Drummond, who was legitimately one of the worst players in the NBA last season, and now looks much more like himself. He has clearly lost weight and is moving much more like he did during his 2021 run with the Sixers than his 2024-25 season.

I keep expecting this to fall off, but the Sixers are winning Drummond’s minutes by a considerable margin – they have a net rating of +7.3 when he is on the floor. If that holds, it would be the best mark for a backup center in the entire Embiid era.

I’m also a believer in the three point shot. He’s at 40 percent on two attempts per game! Let it fly, big fella.

The trio of Barlow, Walker, and Watford is likely good enough to ward off any need for a win-now trade

One of the concerns that I expressed throughout the summer was that, while it’d be foolish to make a huge win-now trade, the trio of Trendon Watford and two two-way guys might leave such a catastrophic weakness at the power forward spot that the team (like last year) is simply too small to compete in any real way.

I no longer hold that concern. Barlow and Walker, in particular, have done just enough and have been the exact right fit to allow the other strengths of this roster to shine through. They are ferocious rebounders who can guard multiple positions – that is really all the Sixers needed.

The winning formula for the Sixers – for The Regulars, at least – is star-quality play from their guards and competence everywhere else. Consider the latter box checked. I give credit to Daryl Morey and co. for filling this need without having to use any real assets. And barring some incredibly favorable deal popping up at the trade deadline, I’d be fully content to let this roster ride out the rest of the year without adding anything else to the power forward rotation.

The Jared McCain situation is troubling on multiple levels

It’s been good to see some shots go down for Jared McCain over the last few games, but consider me still mildly concerned about the situation on multiple levels. The most concerning part is, of course, the fact that he has looked like a shell of himself when he’s played. He had his best shooting game of the season on Sunday, scoring 15 points and hitting 3-4 from deep (but just 2-7 from two). Before that, though, he was averaging just 2.2 points per game on 21 percent from the field in 10.3 minutes per game. And the eye test was just as bad as the stats – he’s looked visibly slower than last season, and was uncomfortable dribbling the ball anywhere near a defender. He has struggled just to get shots off, let alone make one.

But beyond that, I’m worried about the overall outlook and approach that the team is taking towards him, and this is a concern I’ve had for a while. To put it simply, I worry that the organization as a whole is massively underreacting to the season McCain had last year. I think that Nick Nurse’s decision to play him for ultra-limited stretches and bench him whenever he struggles is partly a reflection of that – at the very least, it doesn’t seem like getting McCain back in a rhythm is all that much of a priority to him. Again, the only time he has played more than 15 minutes in a game this season was Sunday against the Heat, which was basically by necessity given that V.J. Edgecombe was out.

You may also recall that last season, even after McCain exploded for 24.3 points per game for a nine game stretch in November, Nurse yanked McCain back out of the starting lineup as soon as the team’s backcourt became fully healthy, opting not to start him alongside Maxey. He came off the bench for five of his last six games prior to tearing his meniscus, with a couple of those games curiously featuring only around 20 minutes of run for McCain. That might seem like a small decision looking back, but given how awful last year’s team was and how incredible McCain’s breakout was, it was a genuinely baffling move at the time.

Even Daryl Morey, in an RTRS appearance prior to the draft lottery, repeatedly expressed his confidence in a future Maxey-Grimes backcourt, emphasizing the defensive fit between those two and making a perhaps purposeful, perhaps accidental omission of McCain. Throughout the interview, Morey just generally never expressed the type of praise for McCain that most Sixers fans would expect.

If my tea-leaf reading is correct, and Morey and Nurse do not in fact view McCain in the same light that us fans do, I simply don’t know what the hell they watched last season. Those 23 games were insanely special. I felt like I was watching a perennial future All-Star. The fact that it isn’t a bigger priority to get McCain up to speed is just bizarre to me; getting last year’s version (or better!) of McCain would make this team way, way better. They need his spacing, his shot creation, and more so than anything, his ability to allow Maxey to play less than 40 minutes per game.

The fact that he has struggled so much is a huge bummer. Maybe it’s partly injury related, but if it is just a matter of rhythm and conditioning, the Sixers are prolonging this process for no obvious reason. He needs to play. I am clueless as to why we keep seeing his minutes in the single digits. Everyone involved should know better. He should be considered a massive part of this team’s future, and I worry that the team may not view things that way.

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Mike O’Connor is the best O’Connor in basketball writing. Previously of The Athletic, you can find Mike on Twitter @MOConnor_NBA. Mike’s writing is brought to you by Body Bio, supplements based on science, focusing on your gut and brain health.

Heading into the season, you could’ve found expectations all over the map for Joel Embiid. Some optimistic fans saw the off-season workout footage of Embiid and wondered if he might be all the way back. Other fans, more disillusioned with Embiid, likely expected him to continue to decline in terms of quality of play, and to once again struggle to stay in the lineup.

Based on the trajectory Embiid had been on for the past 18 months heading into the season, you couldn’t really disregard the latter group of fans as totally crazy. Embiid’s struggles last season were the type of issues that star players – star big men, in particular – rarely rebound from.

In that 2024-25 season, Joel Embiid played just 19 games, divided into three separate stints – one in November, one from mid-December to early January, and one in February. And while there were moments of brilliance and his numbers were never outright terrible, each stretch of games for the big fella followed a similar pattern: he looked roughly like his usual self upon returning, and slowly looked worse and worse over the course of several games until he became completely unable to play.

This pattern was most obvious in Joel’s final stint in February. He posted a 29-point triple double in his return against the Mavericks on February 4th, but five games later against Brooklyn, he could hardly get up and down the floor as he posted just 14 points on 4-13 shooting in a miserable loss to the tanking Nets. Embiid was shut down for the year shortly thereafter.

Just 10 games into the season — only six of which he’s actually played in — it’s still far too early to take any conclusive victory laps on Embiid’s health. But any discussion of Joel’s season so far should start here: The simple fact that he has been able to play six games this season without his production and overall mobility visibly tailing off is a positive sign. A small feat? Sure. But one that he could not accomplish nine months ago.

In fact, if anything, Embiid has gotten better with every game he’s played this year. After a stinker on opening night in Boston, he’s put up 20+ points in every game he’s played since. He’s up to 19.7 points per game on just 23 minutes per night. After an off-season where many (including myself) asked him to consider shifting into a role resembling a souped-up Brook Lopez, he has clearly exceeded that. He is still a star-level offensive player. He has carried the offense for long stretches, including his 18 point first half against Chicago and his 16 point second half against Toronto. Keep everything the same for the next few months – the frequency of his play, the statistical output, and even the minutes restriction – and Embiid would have a real case for making the All-Star team. Long way to go, lots can change, etc. etc. But I think Sixers fans should feel thrilled with how he looks so far.

That said, Embiid’s play has of course been inconsistent, even from quarter to quarter. Tuesday night’s loss against Chicago, in which he scored just two points in the second half, was probably the best example of that. After dominating the first half, a visibly fatigued Embiid struggled to score on Nikola Vucevic (who he has always dominated) and stagnated the offense en route to a crushing loss. In that sense, despite all of the promise that Embiid is showing, that loss should still serve as a lesson for the immediate future: becoming overly reliant on the big fella to carry your half court offense is still a dangerous bet. Even when Embiid is dominating, it should ideally feel as though it’s largely coming within the flow of the offense. Any stretch where Embiid carries them should be looked at as gravy. Relying on him to do that for full games is foolish.

And while I’d love to be proven wrong, I don’t think that distinction is primarily about conditioning or rhythm. Embiid has clearly lost a good chunk of athleticism from where he was at his peak. He’s still obviously able to rely on his shooting touch, size, coordination, and basketball IQ to get him to a star-level statistical pace, but he no longer has the top-end explosiveness that allowed him to get to that MVP-level, 35-point-per-game scoring clip.

There will continue to be a feeling-out period between Embiid and the rest of the team in terms of what exactly they can put on his shoulders. Such is often the case for aging big men with young star guards by their side. But it is certainly clear that Embiid is still a net positive and the team is better any time he is out there. While it’s still early, I think it’s fair to give Nick Nurse some credit for how he has balanced the need to fit Embiid into the offense while still centering things around Maxey and the rest of the guards. The offense has clearly been less Embiid-centric than years past, but Joel is still putting up high-level numbers. That balance is difficult to strike, and Nurse has done it well.

Since the start of the season, there’s been a small but vocal minority of fans begging for Embiid and Paul George to be traded. The idea is that they are “in the way” of the young guys, and they would have a more clear-cut identity if they just go full-on youth movement. I find that to be ridiculous – as I said, the balance between Embiid and the guards has felt pretty smooth. It doesn’t often feel as though Embiid’s production is coming at the expense of others. After last night’s loss to Detroit, the Sixers are now 1-2 without Embiid, and you’d be hard pressed to make the case based on watching them that the Embiid-less Sixers wouldn’t be a below .500 team without Embiid. I don’t think we are missing out on anything special by not handing the keys over to Adem Bona.

The on/off numbers might show a different story – the Sixers are 4.4 points worse per 100 possessions with Embiid on the floor so far – but a huge chunk of that is being caused by unsustainable shooting luck. Opponents are shooting 4.4 percent better from 3 with Embiid on the floor, and while some of that may have to do with Embiid’s mobility issues defensively, a differential that big almost always has more to do with small sample size luck.

Overall, Embiid is playing at an even higher level and with better frequency than I’d hoped he’d be able to. He still impacts the game at a star-level offensively, his defense is improving as the season goes on, and whatever the best version of this year’s Sixers team is, it involves Embiid being on the floor and being heavily involved. If he’s able to continue to play at this rate, I’d consider it a huge win based on where my expectations were nine months ago.

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Mike O’Connor is the best O’Connor in basketball writing. Previously of The Athletic, you can find Mike on Twitter @MOConnor_NBA. Mike’s writing is brought to you by Body Bio, supplements based on science, focusing on your gut and brain health.

The Sixers are 4-0! The vibes are immaculate, as Quentin Grimes said. V.J. Edgecombe looks like a star. Tyrese Maxey is playing like an MVP candidate. Joel Embiid is back to putting up more points than minutes played. Young players that the Sixers signed on the margins like Dominick Barlow and Jabari Walker are showing promise. Jared McCain and Paul George are on track to return soon. Everything is coming up aces for this team – I can’t even believe it!

Let’s get into some key takeaways from their electrifying start.

The vibe shift from last year

Unless you’re a true sicko who watched every game last season, you probably can’t really appreciate how different this year feels compared to last year. Yes, the Sixers are 4-0, which is remarkable in and of itself – they didn’t notch their 4th win until November 30th last season – but even if a couple of these fourth quarters had gone the other way, it’d still be undeniable that the Sixers are a more fun, resilient, likable group than they were last year. All I’ve asked for in recent years is for the Sixers to be exactly that, and they finally are. I feel like a proud father.

Personnel changes are largely to thank, of course. Inserting V.J. Edgecombe and Quentin Grimes into what were Kyle Lowry and Eric Gordon’s spots in the rotation at this time last year has been a massive injection of physicality and overall vitality. But I think it’s important to give credit to the franchise cornerstones who were here last year and made an effort to change the culture.

Tyrese Maxey has been the ringleader there; the fact that he spoke this into existence at media day is pretty remarkable. But it’s also been noticeable that Nick Nurse and Joel Embiid are happier, less doomer-y, and more engaged on a day-to-day basis.

I don’t have a ton of analysis to provide on this front, I just want to give a ton of credit where it is due. This does not happen very often in sports; generally, when a team becomes completely and utterly miserable, that doesn’t change until you blow up the roster. For the Sixers to have taken the misery of last year and used it to establish a real culture and identity moving forward – I just can’t say enough good things about everyone involved.

The Maxey-Edgecombe-Grimes synergy

One of the bold predictions that I made last week which I’ve already gained confidence in is that the Sixers’ best lineup combination at the 1-2-3 spots will be Maxey, Edgecombe, and Grimes. Those lineups are absolutely destroying opponents through three games – the Sixers are +33.3 per 100 possessions (albeit in only 132 possessions) with those three on the floor together.

The biggest key to their success offensively is the fact that Edgecombe and Grimes are so elite at capitalizing the attention that Maxey generates with the ball. I think it’s pretty poetic that this was Edgecombe’s first bucket in the NBA – he is so slippery and so explosive with the ball that he’s able to punish even the slightest degree of gap help from opposing defenses. Even without being an elite jump shooter, you still can’t leave him without the ball, or he’ll maneuver his way into a driving lane with ease.

Grimes and Edgecombe are both elite connectors. They close gaps and manipulate space at a really high level. Defenses are forced to choose between leaving someone fully on an island with Maxey, or send enough help to force a pass, which results in high quality looks for Grimes.

All off-season long, I begged for more offensive structure from Nick Nurse. Truth be told, there has been some, but not a ton of improvement there. The fact is that most of the Sixers’ improvement on offense has come from the fact that they can finally leverage the attention that their stars get, whereas last year most of these possessions resulted in players like Lowry, Gordon, or Caleb Martin getting walled off on drives and failing to collapse the defense.

Again, that’s not a critique. The Sixers have the No. 1 ranked offense in the league through four games. That may very well change, but their start to the season on that end of the floor has been excellent, and in my opinion, pretty sustainable. It’s also important to note that they have a couple of key weapons they’ll have the chance to integrate very soon. Which brings me to my next point…

The challenge ahead for Nick Nurse

Some of the discourse around Paul George and Jared McCain returning has been pretty dumb – they are obviously going to play major minutes and they will help the team considerably. Just because the team is playing excellent basketball doesn’t mean you should think twice about adding two very good, very versatile players back into your rotation. But I do think that it’s important to lay out the fact that their return will represent a legitimate challenge for Nick Nurse, and one that he failed miserably last season.

That challenge is the following: George and McCain need to feel additive when they return. They need to find ways to mesh with the team’s current offensive structure and make life easier for everyone else. They can’t just feel like two extra mouths that need feeding.

That might sound simple, but it wasn’t the case last season. Last year, Nurse simply did not find ways to make these two guys all that useful without the ball. He mostly tried to turn both players into one-on-one creators, substituting them in place of Embiid or Maxey when one of their two stars wasn’t running the offense. And if he tries to do that again this year, it will feel as though there are not enough basketballs to go around.

After McCain and George are back, we should all be marveling at how much easier life gets for Maxey, Embiid, Edgecombe and Grimes. The offense should feel even more cohesive and free-flowing. That is precisely what George and McCain would bring to the other 29 teams!

I may be overly concerned about this because of how ugly last year’s offense got, but it’s a lesson that Nurse has to prove that he has learned. I’m really asking for simple stuff. Run these guys off of pin-downs! Have them set tons of screens off the ball! Literally, turn on a Golden State Warriors game, diagram three of Steph Curry’s pet plays, and run them for McCain. This is simple stuff!

I’m not concerned by the difficulty of the concept, I’m concerned that Nurse will make it more complicated than it needs to be, because that’s what he did last year. The early-season returns from the offense look good – if he manages to keep that up when the team is at full strength, I’ll feel fully at ease.

The backup center minutes

For the first time in his entire career (albeit only on a four-game sample), the Sixers are playing better basketball with Joel Embiid off the floor versus when he is on. They are +13.3 points per 100 possessions with him off, and -11.1 with him on. Both Adem Bona and Andre Drummond are winning their minutes – the Sixers are +18.2 with Bona at center, and +3.8 with Drummond.

Again, it’s only been four games, and history tells us that these numbers will change, if not fully reverse. But I do think that it’s worth discussing the center rotation in general and how the minutes should be allocated.

Assuming Embiid continues to play 20-25 minutes per game in the immediate future, I think it’s perfectly reasonable to have Drummond and Bona split the remaining minutes. Both provide sparks in unique ways, and considering Bona’s fouling habits and hit-or-miss defense, he’ll need Drummond to spell him for a stretch or two each game.

Drummond returning to life after being legitimately one of the worst players in the NBA last season is a very welcome development. He has stretches, like last week’s fourth quarter against Charlotte, where his rebounding completely changes a game. Having that as a weapon off the bench is valuable for the Sixers.

Similarly, Bona’s ability to go on shot-blocking sprees in a game-wrecking quality that the Sixers have seldom had. The injection of life that it gives the Sixers – especially when it frees up transition offense opportunities, like against Orlando and Washington – is palpable. A Bona block into a Maxey-Edgecombe fast break is one of the more electrifying parts of the Sixers experience.

Overall, I still have some concerns about both Bona and Drummond. I’ll need to see that Drummond can hold up physically, and that Bona can be an above-average decision maker on defense, rather than just an explosion of blocks for a few minutes at a time, before declaring that either one has the advantage in this battle for the team’s C2. Still, I think you’d have to say this is the best backup center rotation the Sixers have had since at least 2022. The fact that they are finally winning the minutes without Embiid is a massive, massive deal.

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Mike O’Connor is the best O’Connor in basketball writing. Previously of The Athletic, you can find Mike on Twitter @MOConnor_NBA. Mike’s writing is brought to you by Body Bio, supplements based on science, focusing on your gut and brain health.

The Sixers are back, and so is my yearly 10 Bold Predictions for the Sixers Season column, which I’ve unintentionally forgotten to do for the past couple years. Sorry about that! But now that we are on the precipice of the most unpredictable season in all my years following the team, I figured this would be the perfect time to bring it back.

As always, some of these are a bit arbitrary, but I’ll do my best to grade these fairly when I look back on them at the end of the year. Let’s begin!

1. Tyrese Maxey averages 28+ points per game and makes the All-Star team

When Sixers fans talk about Maxey’s 2025 season being a disappointment – where he missed the All-Star team after making it for the first time in 2023-24 – I think there’s a lack of acknowledgement for how much progress he made as the season went along. In reality, the only time that Maxey truly struggled last year was at the very beginning of the year, when the team got out to a 1-6 start with him in the lineup before he injured his hamstring.

After returning to full health, Maxey helped lead the team to a 17-19 record before suffering more injuries in late February that ultimately ended his season. During that stretch, he averaged 28.5 points, 6.8 assists, and 1.9 steals per game on relatively solid efficiency. I think a lightbulb went off for him at some point around December of last season in terms of what it takes to carry the load as a No. 1 option; Maxey acknowledged this publicly in his media day press conference.

Between the experience that last year afforded him, an improved supporting cast and overall better vibes, I expect Maxey to have a career year and make the All-Star team. It wouldn’t shock me if he made third team All-NBA this year.

Also: It’s worth noting that the team seems to have made a conscious effort to build everything around Maxey this year. He is the undisputed leader of the locker room, and the offense revolves primarily around him. That should make a difference here, as well. Even with Embiid on the floor Friday night, much of what they used the big fella for was opening things up for Maxey and the other guards. Which leads me to my next prediction…

2. Joel Embiid plays 35-40 games and averages ~23 points and ~7 assists

For context, Joel played 19 games last season, averaging 23.8 points and 4.5 assists. The gist of this prediction is that 1) I expect Joel to be healthier this season, but still not as durable or explosive as he was pre-injuries, and 2) I expect the Sixers’ offense to change in a way that allows Embiid to operate more as a passer and play-finisher as opposed to the sole shot creator. If you think I’m being pessimistic here, consider the fact that I’m predicting a huge bump in his assist totals. I’m expecting a much different Joel, not a much worse Joel.

Utilizing Embiid largely as a dribble hand-off partner and a high-post passing hub, as they did in their final pre-season game Friday night, where he only scored 14 points but dished out eight assists in 19 minutes, is the smart and practical way to build their offensive system, considering the fact that they can’t rely on Embiid to be present every night. Hence, why I think Embiid’s assists will tick up and his scoring will tick down.

Again, that doesn’t mean Embiid’s days as a star player are over. Even prior to his injuries, I was always pretty bullish on Embiid’s potential to be a high-level player after his athletic prime is over. He is one of the best mid-range shooters on the planet, he has a great feel for the game, and he’s an elite screen-setter. Whenever he’s healthy enough to step on the court, he will find ways to positively impact the game offensively no matter what his role is.

But I do think that part of what I’m acknowledging here is that this is a different phase of Embiid’s evolution. The MVP days are over, but I don’t think the All-Star days – or at least, the All-Star impact days – are over.

3. V.J. Edgecombe leads the team in deflections, averages 12+ points per game, and makes First Team All-Rookie

Perhaps none of these are all that bold individually, but all three strung together as a 3-leg parlay should be good enough for it to qualify as bold. Let’s get into some specifics.

I think Edgecombe’s defense will be legitimately great in year one – not just relative to your average rookie. His athleticism and IQ are off the charts. His presence alone is going to be enough to make the Sixers a better defensive team compared to last year; his motor and skill set are exactly what the Nick Nurse style of defense needs in order to be successful. Even if his on-ball defense takes a bit to develop, his off-ball impact will be immediate and profound.

Leading this team in deflections would be no small feat – both Kelly Oubre and Paul George are consistently among the league leaders in that category every year. But if preseason is any indication, he will have a fighting shot at it. He gets his hands on absolutely everything.

Regarding his scoring, there will be a lot of ups and downs for Edgecombe in year one. His shooting and general creation ability are, in my opinion, still pretty far away for someone many expect to reach star-level heights in those departments. Where he does shine is in off-ball, role player-like settings, particularly on broken plays where he can use his athleticism to create something out of nothing. That alone will be enough to get him to the 12-ish points per game mark.

Whatever V.J. becomes as an offensive player is still years away from becoming clear. I still think the pick could be considered a successful one if he tops out as an Alex Caruso / Josh Hart level of player – an elite defender with an iffy jump shot who still manages to be a positive offensive player through IQ and hustle plays. What remains to be seen is if he can ascend beyond that into a two-way impact that allows him to be in the mix for All-Star teams – something like a 6’4” version of Andre Iguodala.

I suspect that the discourse around V.J.’s rookie year will be a litmus test for who is actually watching the games versus who isn’t. I think he will shine as a role player and defender, but there will be nights where he’s 1-8 from deep while Ace Bailey puts up some cool highlights and Twitter starts complaining about the pick.

Here’s the thing: I watched some of the Ace minutes from the pre-season. Will Hardy and the Jazz are using him like Rip Hamilton. He is flying around screens and they are barely letting him dribble in the half court. If he fully buys into that role, he’ll be great! If he demands to be given more freedom so he can play more like Kevin Durant – which he has made abundantly clear that he likely will do – he’ll probably struggle quite a bit. Time will tell which of those scenarios comes true.

What I do know is that Edgecombe is going to be fun, likeable, impactful and drama-free from night one. I think he will help transform the Sixers’ defense, show some flashes on offense, and ultimately find his way on First Team All-Rookie.

4. Dominick Barlow ends up playing the most minutes out of the team’s new power forward options

I’m buying the Barlow hype!

I’m not just saying this because they kinda physically resemble one another – the way that Barlow operates on the glass reminds me a bit of Matisse Thybulle on defense. He gets his hands on things that you almost can’t believe he’s able to get to.

Between his motor and athleticism, I think there’s a really solid chance Barlow becomes a mainstay in the rotation. He might even start opening night. Throw in Jabari Walker’s iffy pre-season and Trendon Watford’s uncertain health, and I feel pretty good about this prediction.

5. Justin Edwards struggles to crack the rotation in year two

I don’t think it’s an accident that in the final pre-season game, still missing Paul George and Trendon Watford, Edwards barely played prior to the fourth quarter.

The sell on Edwards last season was that he’s an above-average shooter who is precisely average at everything else. But in summer league and pre-season play, Edwards has not shot the ball well, and has generally looked as though he’s trying to force things in a way that he simply did not last season.

I’m not expecting him to fall totally out of the rotation, but between his struggles and the additional depth that this team has, it wouldn’t shock me at all if Edwards spends most or all of the season on the fringes. He’s a useful ninth man, but his play of late has certainly been concerning, and I’m a little cooler on him than I was last winter.

6. Eric Gordon, Andre Drummond, and Kelly Oubre, Jr. get dealt at the trade deadline

Oubre is very superfluous on this team. There isn’t a ton of need for him from a basketball perspective. My expectation that he will be traded is largely due to the fact that it will make sense to trade him regardless of how this season goes. If the team is struggling, they will dump his contract to duck the tax. If the team looks great, they will trade him for a better-fitting win-now piece.

Oubre is their largest expiring salary, and they can get under the luxury tax threshold just by dumping his contract. It wouldn’t shock me if the Sixers attempt to do some combination of win-now plus salary dumping, as they’ve done at each of the past two deadlines. An Oubre salary dump plus a Grimes-type trade involving Drummond, Eric Gordon, and picks might make some sense.

7. The Sixers will have a top-10 defense in the league

Doug Collins used to talk all the time about how easy it is to be competent in the NBA. That was really his whole shtick – he would go to a lifeless team, get them to play hard as hell, and their win total would go up by 5-10 games despite him not bringing any real tactical innovations to the table.

I say that to make the point that one of the reasons the Sixers will be better this season compared to last season is the sheer fact that I expect them to play much, much harder. They are younger, more athletic, more competitive, and the guys that were here last year are at least somewhat pissed off.

Additionally, I think it’s worth noting that the Nick Nurse style of defense – one which demands tons of movement and decision making from its personnel – is much better suited for this year’s roster compared to last year’s. As I touched on above, I expect Edgecombe to make a real difference in year one, and the defense will feel more cohesive just thanks to his presence. Throw in a full year of Grimes, far fewer Andre Drummond minutes, plus legitimate wing bodies who are high-motor, and I think this team will have a really tough defense.

8. Quentin Grimes proves playable at small forward… and re-signs here on a long term contract

The real prediction here is that Grimes and Edgecombe prove to be more than playable as a duo. Parsing which of them is the small forward in that lineup isn’t really that important – though it is worth noting that Grimes has played 29 percent of his minutes in the NBA at the small forward position, according to Basketball Reference. Between the two of them, I think Grimes is more suited to guard big wings at the moment, so I’d call him the three.

Regardless, I think it will become clear very early on that Maxey-Edgecombe-Grimes is their best 1-2-3 combination, and that the three of them can play together long term if Grimes re-signs here. If I were Nick Nurse, my starting lineup on opening night would be those three, Barlow, and Embiid.

I’m a relative optimist on Grimes in general; I think the scoring flashes we saw last year were mostly legit. It would not shock me at all if Grimes is the Sixers’ third-leading scorer this season.

And while most people have probably assumed that there is bad blood there and that the Sixers stand no chance of re-signing him next summer, I don’t view that as being the case. The amount of cap space that should be available league-wide has been far overblown; it should only be marginally better than this past summer, and most of the teams with space are teams that could have made a run at Grimes this year. I don’t expect him to be fielding $30 million AAV offers left and right.

The Sixers have over $20 million in salary coming off the books after this year, including Grimes’ $8.7 million qualifying offer. They’ll be $25 million shy of the luxury tax heading into the off-season. If this year goes well for both Grimes and the team, I think it would make a ton of sense for him to be back here long term.

9. Jared McCain and Paul George shoot over 40 percent from deep

There are many areas of Sixers fandom where you’d be an idiot to suggest that “it can’t get any worse than last year,” but shooting luck for truly great shooters is not one of them. It would be absolutely stunning if George has another down shooting year after shooting just 35.8 percent from deep in 2025. I’m expecting him to be closer to where he was in 2024, when he shot 41.3 percent.

Regarding McCain, the fact that he even shot 38 percent on threes as a rookie despite having to carry the offense for extended stretches is pretty remarkable. This year, with the chance to settle into a less burdensome role, I expect him to cross the 40 percent threshold.

10. The Sixers exceed their expected win total of 42.5

Obviously, anyone expecting the Sixers to exceed their projections is making a bet on them getting better health from their stars. And as I alluded to above, I do think we will see Embiid and George play better and more often than last year.

But an equally large part of my reason for optimism is the fact that I really, really strongly believe that a large chunk of the Sixers’ problems last season boil down to three things: coaching, shooting luck and a catastrophic lack of size on the wing.

Regarding coaching, it’s already clear to me from the pre-season that Nick Nurse and co. will be running a more intricate offense than they did last year. Will he strike gold on some sort of new, revolutionary offensive structure? Probably not. Will it be enough to give them a fighting chance at competency, unlike last year? I think so.

I touched on the shooting luck above – that is the one thing, unlike injuries, which one can very reasonably say that it’s almost impossible for it to continue to be just as bad this season.

And regarding their issues on the wing, I view Barlow, Walker, and Watford as being just competent enough to allow for the strengths of this roster to shine through. Having George for more games would obviously help, as well. A full season of Grimes, plus the addition of Edgecombe – both of whom do wing-like things in terms of their rebounding, deflections, and switchability – will also help quite a bit. And of course, they will have the flexibility to trade expiring contracts like Oubre and Drummond for a starting-caliber forward, if they so choose.

Some better coaching, improved depth and anything besides absolute rock-bottom injury and shooting luck will make this an above-average basketball team. There is noticeably more hunger and noticeably less loser energy on this team compared to last season. Their win total should be somewhere in the mid-40s. I wouldn’t bet the house on it, but I feel more confident in it than most people seem to throughout the basketball internet.

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It’s that time of year again, folks. Everyone is in the best shape of their lives (except Kyle Lowry), everyone is in a great mood, and everyone has eliminated every weakness they had in their game six months ago. Media day, which took place at the Sixers’ practice facility Friday morning, is always filled with straight-up propaganda — but if I’m being honest, it’s comforting propaganda, and I look forward to it every year.

Let’s break down some of the major takeaways from Sixers media day, and also discuss some of the latest news on Quentin Grimes and Jared McCain.

Joel Embiid sounds and looks better but offers no specifics

Joel Embiid is visibly skinnier than he was around this time last year, and offered some vague optimism about the state of his health, saying, “I’m excited to keep progressing. I feel really good.”

Embiid did not come out and state directly whether or not he will be participating in training camp, or whether he expects to play in the season opener. I could opt to rip him and the team for the 100th time for not offering specifics (why couldn’t he say whether or not he would participate in training camp in literally one day?), but since it’s media day and the general vibe of Embiid’s presser was positive, I’ll just settle for whatever positive developments I can get. He sounds good, he looks good, and if they’re secretly planning to sit him for the first couple weeks of the season, they’re doing a good job of throwing us off the scent.

Tyrese Maxey embraces leadership

I thought the best quote of the day came from Tyrese Maxey regarding the need for the Sixers to establish an identity regardless of who is on the floor.

“We need to set a standard,” Maxey said. “This is who we are, no matter who plays, who doesn’t play.”

This overall theme was echoed by Embiid and Nick Nurse. If there’s one real positive to take away from today, it’s that I genuinely believe that the core of the team is pissed off and motivated by how awful last year was. There’s some real intensity in the air.

One of the biggest issues the Sixers faced last year was the inconsistency of their effort, regardless of what personnel they had available. After climbing out of their initial hole to start the season and getting their record back to 15-20 in early January, they went on to lose seven games in a row, culminating in an embarrassing blowout loss in Denver, after which Nick Nurse publicly called the team out for lack of effort.

After Nurse’s callout, with fans just about ready to embrace the idea of tanking, they went on to win five out of seven games while playing some of their most inspired basketball of the season. At that point, Embiid and Paul George were about to return from injury, and it seemed like they were ready to go on a run. They then lost nine in a row, eventually cementing the need to tank away the season.

From the start of the year, it just never felt like the Sixers’ effort level was consistently where it needed to be. They were awful in most of the hustle stats categories, and it just seemed like a defeated, deflated group from start to finish. Maxey sending the message that he is determined to correct that was perhaps the most encouraging development of the day.

More small-ball lineups incoming

I’m not going to sound any alarms just yet, but one of the more concerning patterns of the day was the frequency with which both the players and Nick Nurse discussed going to small-ball lineups. Maxey mentioned looking forward to playing 3-guard lineups, Paul George expressed willingness to be a full-time power forward, and Nurse repeatedly stated that positions are somewhat meaningless nowadays, and that there are really good teams that play four guards on a regular basis.

I can only assume Nurse is thinking about OKC here, which is a terrible comparison to the Sixers’ personnel; the Thunder have absolute freaks of nature in their backcourt like Alex Caruso and Lu Dort, who can credibly guard most centers. Playing Kelly Oubre at the four is not remotely the same.

Last season, the Sixers’ small-ball lineups were repeatedly awful, whereas many of their best lineups were traditionally sized. If Nurse thinks he can get away with playing a ton of lineups with Adem Bona – an undersized center in his own right – and four guards, he’s got another thing coming.

Sizing up the Quentin Grimes situation

The only Grimes takeaway from media day was that Daryl Morey expects a resolution “in the next few days.” Grimes, of course, has until October 1 to decide whether or not to accept a one-year, $8.7 million qualifying offer — which comes with a full no-trade clause, and serves as the closest thing possible to a hard deadline in this situation.

Gina Mizell of The Inquirer reported recently that the Sixers’ offer has been four years, $39 million, whereas Grimes and his agent are seeking $20-25 million annually.

Multiple reporters, including Shams Charania of ESPN, have indicated that the most likely solution here is a one-year balloon payment in which Grimes waives his right to a no-trade clause. That’s not a disaster outcome for the Sixers – it would retain Grimes’ value as a trade asset, while also maintaining the Sixers’ access to his bird rights, allowing them to offer him a lucrative long term contract next off-season if both sides can agree to it.

That said, the best outcome here would still be for both sides to meet in the middle and come to a long term deal at around $15 million per year. That’s a fair price for a player of Grimes’ caliber, and I’d be shocked if he’s going to get much more than that on the open market next season if he were to take a one-year deal. It is of course possible that some team out there becomes enamored with him and clears up the cap space necessary to sign him, but I’d say the two most likely outcomes by far are that he either remains a Sixer long term or is traded at some point in the next two years.

While I like Grimes and I believe in the flashes he showed as a scorer last year, you simply cannot pay a player of his caliber more than $20 million per year, even in the position the Sixers are in. That is death in the era of the second apron. He is, at best, the fourth best player on a title team, and you cannot afford to pay that type of player $20-plus million if you want to be a serious team.

So, I credit Daryl Morey and company for at least not grossly overpaying Grimes. If he returns on a one-year balloon deal, that’s not the worst outcome in the world – him returning on the qualifying offer, feeling angry at the team and determined to walk away in the off-season at all costs, would in fact be a far worse outcome.

Jared McCain’s injury could be worse

Shams reported on Friday that Jared McCain tore his UCL in his right thumb during a workout on Thursday and will likely miss 4-6 weeks due to his thumb injury, which is about the best possible outcome in this situation – these injuries often last up to eight weeks.

While it’s a bummer and I’m sad for McCain, I’m not all that concerned about either his or the team’s long term fallout from this. If he has to miss the first 2-3 weeks of the season, so be it. The kid is a stud and all indications are that he will be completely fine in the long term.

In his absence, it’ll be interesting to see V.J. Edgecombe get thrown into the fire as a ball-handler right away. Or, perhaps we will get to see Kyle Lowry play his final meaningful minutes as a pro while doing in-game interviews for the NBA on Prime, like a right fielder getting grilled by the ESPN Sunday Night Baseball team. Either way, I still expect big things from McCain this year.

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Mike O’Connor is the best O’Connor in basketball writing. Previously of The Athletic, you can find Mike on Twitter @MOConnor_NBA. Mike’s writing is brought to you by Body Bio, supplements based on science, focusing on your gut and brain health.

There’s nothing that makes you feel like an idiot quite like being a sports fan. All off-season long, I’ve been banging the drum that we shouldn’t really expect anything meaningful this Sixers season in terms of wins and losses, but instead we should try and focus on enjoying watching the development of the team’s young core. All I care about is the vibes, I said.

And then, I saw the Sixers social team post a six-second video of Joel Embiid partaking in an individual workout and appearing to be in great shape, and I started daydreaming. All it took was just one small glimmer of hope, and I’ve already let my mind run away with it. At this point, if the reports out of training camp are positive, and the Sixers start the season 3-0 on the backs of good performances from Embiid, I’ll be thinking about a deep playoff run. I know, I’m an idiot.

But then again… am I an idiot? Don’t we all agree that the Sixers should be in the mix for the playoffs almost regardless of what they get from Embiid and Paul George? Doesn’t the East still suck? Can Embiid and PG just be healthy for 3.5 consecutive weeks of basketball in April and May? That would be enough to get them to the Conference Finals.

Yeah yeah, I know, the chances of it all coming together remain very small. But I do think that if you’re refusing to even entertain the possibility, you’re just engaging in a self-protection mechanism from all the disappointment of the last several years. To a certain extent, I feel as though Ben Simmons and James Harden have done irreparable damage to our brains – the cycle of always looking like a contender only to always pathetically flame out in the playoffs has scarred us so much that we now care about being fun and respectable more so than we care about actually winning.

While I’m certainly not backtracking on any of the lessons we’ve learned from all of the playoff flame-outs, I do think that we should all probably care more and expect more in terms of winning. Once the Quentin Grimes contract hits the books, the Sixers will more than likely have a top-10 payroll in the league. They’ve got three players who made the All-Star team two years ago, and two incredibly promising young guards off the bench. If the team seems remotely worth investing in, they have plenty of assets to use to acquire more depth. If the Sixers are abjectly awful once again, it would be an absolute embarrassment. Missing the playoffs would be an unacceptable failure.

While I didn’t share AU’s neverending quest to keep everyone on the “win now” bandwagon last season, I do think there’s a large kernel of truth in what he was saying. We, as fans, only get so many of these. If you’re quick to punt on the season any time you’re not obviously in the inner circle of contenders, you might as well not follow the team at all. By that standard, only 2-3 times per decade will you have a team worth caring about, if you’re lucky.

His message rings even more true if you are the type of fan still heavily invested in winning with Embiid. If this year is another dumpster fire for Embiid’s health and the team overall, it’s more than likely that the team will subsequently enter into a much different phase of their life cycle that somewhat resembles a true rebuild. If you want to see them win something with Joel, you’d better hope it happens this year; we can’t afford to only care about vibes.

While acknowledging what a sucker I am for entertaining some semblance of belief, I do think it’s worth tinkering a bit with the “only caring about the vibes” mentality that I’ve been carrying with me all off-season. There is a parasocial element to following a sports team, and it’s great that we’re all trying to prioritize enjoying that aspect of it. But sports are also a proxy for war. And I can’t name very many wars where one side got their asses kicked over and over again but had a really nice time.

Even if their luck is as bad as it was last year, the Sixers should not be a terrible basketball team once again. And if their luck is even slightly on the positive side, they should be a legitimately good team. They are not in need of some unimaginable set of circumstances in order to be a fun, formidable team. They just need one or two good things to happen to them – or, put differently, they need one or two bad things to not happen to them.

Perhaps in a very short amount of time, I’ll feel dumb for asking this question. But is it really so hard to believe that good things could happen to the Philadelphia 76ers?

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Mike O’Connor is the best O’Connor in basketball writing. Previously of The Athletic, you can find Mike on Twitter @MOConnor_NBA. Mike’s writing is brought to you by Body Bio, supplements based on science, focusing on your gut and brain health.

Trying to feel out the Sixers’ vibe around this time of year is always tricky. Around this time a year ago, I probably would’ve said I was pretty ecstatic for the upcoming season, which of course turned into a disaster very quickly. If you talked to me around this time two years ago, I would have been absolutely disgusted by the thought of Sixers basketball being right around the corner, but then they started the year 8-1, and I was back to liking them again.

Things change quickly with this team. So, even if I felt like I had a strong sense of what the vibes would be for the 2025-26 Sixers – good or bad – it probably wouldn’t mean very much.

So, rather than make a prediction for how the vibes will be this year, I figured it would be a better idea to discuss some hypothetical ways that the Sixers could turn themselves into a fun hang this year.

Because really, that’s all we can ask for, right? The days of championship-or-bust are over for any sane Sixers fan. This year, a more reasonable goal than a top-3 seed or a Conference Finals appearance is simply having a team that is enjoyable to watch on a nightly basis. So, let’s think about how they might be able to make that happen.

Jared McCain and V.J. Edgecombe vibe-proof the team

Any time I see someone put the Sixers in the discussion of teams that have the bleakest futures in the NBA, I have to wonder if they have simply forgotten that Edgecombe and McCain exist. If these two guys are as good as projected, no version of the Sixers’ next five years could really be that bad. How many teams have two players under 21 who are this good?

On top of how good they are, they are both delightful to root for and watch. No matter how the Sixers’ guard rotation shakes out this year – these two might both be limited to 20ish minutes per game – the flashes that we see from them should likely be enough to prevent us from ever truly hating the 2025-26 Sixers.

I have high expectations for both of these guys; I think McCain should be a 6MOY candidate, and I think Edgecombe’s athleticism and defensive IQ will help lead to obvious improvements over last year’s defense. But even if the overall impact isn’t quite where I expect it to be, I do think that the sheer delightfulness of these two will be the biggest thing preventing the vibes from being too downtrodden this season.

The organization figures out how to decenter Joel Embiid’s health status from the daily discourse

I can’t properly emphasize how important this is – regardless of whether Embiid plays 55 games or 25 games, it is absolutely crucial that the team figures out how to make sure that the season isn’t plagued by inconsistent messaging, leaving the media to have to badger Nick Nurse on a daily basis in regards to what is happening with Embiid.

“What is going on with Embiid?” should not be a daily question we are all asking ourselves.

A good way to get started on the right foot here would be for the team to properly communicate whether or not Embiid is participating in training camp. We should not have to wait until the end of Day 1 – or later – to find out if Embiid is a full go or not.

I can already imagine what the exchange between Nurse and the media will be after Day 1 of camp.

“Was Joel a full participant in camp today?” – media

“Well, y’know, he was around. Did some stuff, had some good moments. Just trying to ramp up a bit, get back in the flow of the things. I would say overall we’re happy with where he’s at, we just want to be smart about things. So, we’ll see how he responds and hopefully we’ll have more updates as time goes along.” – Nurse

I already want to pull my hair out just thinking about it.

All I can realistically ask for is the team to take as cautious an approach as possible in communicating. The goal should be to undersell and hopefully overdeliver. If Embiid is unlikely to participate in training camp, tell us! If he’s likely to miss the start of the season, tell us! It could all be so simple!

Paul George looks solid and resuscitates his trade value

It really is hard to overstate how important this Paul George season is for both the Sixers’ present and future. I’m not exaggerating when I say that George being good this season will alter the course of their next half-decade.

For starters, it would be huge for the Sixers’ young guards to be able to develop alongside a half-decent wing rotation that includes PG, rather than a bunch of undersized minimum contract guys – I want their developmental years to take place with a roster that makes sense, rather than one where they are forced into all sorts of weird roles.

Secondly, if George can prove himself valuable enough to have roughly neutral trade value at the deadline or in the off-season, that would be a lifesaver for the Sixers’ future. Assuming Embiid’s contract stays on the books long term, being able to dump George would open up real long term flexibility before they have to pay McCain and Edgecombe their rookie extensions. If they were somehow able to trade George for expiring deals at this upcoming trade deadline, they could potentially open up $30 million or more in cap space for the summer of 2026, depending on what Quentin Grimes’ deal looks like. At that point, if Embiid is still chronically injured, it may be worth having a conversation about stretching his contract in order to open up max space for that summer.

But I’m getting ahead of myself here. The bottom line is that George being viewed as somewhat valuable in a trade would make a massive difference for the Sixers’ long term flexibility. Being stuck eating two $50 million contracts is death; the Sixers would be completely cap strapped through 2029. If George plays himself into tradeable territory, their future looks a lot different, and their present becomes far more palatable.

One player from the fringes of the roster exceeds expectations

Purely from a vibes perspective, the idea of someone like Trendon Watford or Jabari Walker coming in from the fringes of the league and establishing themselves as a real NBA player would be thrilling to watch. But really, the Sixers need that to happen for more than just the thrill – they are incredibly thin on the wing, and one of Watford or Walker becoming a real dude would help the roster seem more properly sized. If that does wind up happening, it would be a major step towards the Sixers being a serious basketball team rather than just an oddly balanced collection of young talent.

To be clear, though, I do love the feeling of seeing a player explode onto the scene, even if the team itself is incredibly boring. I have fond memories of Jodie Meeks making six threes in the first quarter against the Bobcats, even if we all knew that team was going nowhere. Can we get something similar out of this group? Can we get a Watford triple double in early November? Something like that coming to fruition would go a long way towards sewing good vibes.

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Mike O’Connor is the best O’Connor in basketball writing. Previously of The Athletic, you can find Mike on Twitter @MOConnor_NBA. Mike’s writing is brought to you by Body Bio, supplements based on science, focusing on your gut and brain health.

If you had told me a year ago that the Sixers were about to have a disaster season, I think most of the factors that led to it could have been easily predicted. Joel Embiid missed a bunch of time due to injuries? Bummer, but that checks out. Paul George was injured a lot and looked old when he did play? Ah, that makes sense. Maxey had a couple freak injuries and the veteran guards behind him were even more washed than we thought? Yeah, I could imagine that.

What I would not have expected is to leave the season feeling as though Nick Nurse’s tactical decision making was a massive contributor to the season being as bad as it was. As I wrote in February, I was stunned by Nurse’s inability to adjust the basics of his schemes on both sides of the ball as the team navigated life without MVP-level Embiid.

I suppose the best defense that one could offer for Nurse would be that the team was in a constant state of expecting Embiid to be back on the floor and dominating again within a matter of weeks – so, overhauling both the team’s offense and defense would make little sense when they would just revert back to their far more simplistic system (which worked quite well in ‘23-24!) whenever Embiid was back to being himself.

But this year, no such excuse will exist. We know that Embiid cannot be counted on to play consistently and at his peak level. We know that George is unreliable, past his prime, and is entering the season already injured. We know that an offense based on “let Maxey cook and have everyone else stand around and watch” does not lead to good results.

There needs to be massive, massive changes to the team’s offense, and I expect to know very early on in the season – perhaps even as soon as the preseason – whether Nurse has made such changes. If George and Embiid miss opening night, and the offense once again turns into nothing but Maxey hunting mismatches, I think we can safely assume that Nurse simply has some ideological objection to running an intricate NBA offense. Don’t take it from me – take it from Pat Bev and Marcus Morris, who played under Nurse in ‘23-24, and mutually agreed that, “his offense was nothing.”

As I’ve said before, running that incredibly simple offense is not a bad idea when you have a player as dominant as peak Embiid. It inarguably produced good results two years ago when Embiid played – Jo’s numbers were better than ever, and the team’s offense was absolutely dominant when he was on the floor. But when you are without a player of that caliber, there desperately needs to be a more structured offense, and the coaching staff must offer some ability to scheme up open looks, which Nurse and co. did not have last season.

So, I’m going to need to see some real offensive structure this season. I need to see Jared McCain running through elevator doors screens. I want to see him running through Floppy sets and setting tons of screens off the ball. He needs to be used in similar ways to how Brett Brown used JJ Redick and Marco Belinelli. Nick, just turn on the tape from that ‘17-18 team and run the off-ball sets they ran for their shooters! It’s not that hard!

While I still have major concerns about the Sixers’ front court, the team does now have Trendon Watford, who brings a skill that was woefully absent on last year’s front court – passing. As The Danny highlighted recently, Watford has excellent vision both on the move as well as in post-up situations. If Nurse doesn’t have a few set plays involving Watford passing the ball with high-post splits, I’m going to lose my mind.

For better or for worse, three of the Sixers’ best players – McCain, George, and Maxey – are arguably better at playing off the ball than creating from scratch with it. If this team is going to have any hope of not being terrible, Nurse must find ways to capitalize on their abilities in that area.

Anyone who has followed me for a long time knows that I’m not Mr. Fire The Coach guy. I defended Brett Brown from criticism for a long time, and I was pretty lenient on Doc Rivers up until that fateful Celtics series. I’m even willing to give Nurse a pass for last year if he comes into this season with an offense built to maximize the personnel he’s given. It is certainly possible that he just viewed the season as boom-or-bust, and wasn’t willing to switch to a different offense when A) the team’s only hope of winning anything was with a healthy Embiid, and B) his simplistic offense was the best way to maximize healthy Embiid.

But yeah, suffice it to say that I’m gonna need to see some major changes to this year’s offense if I’m going to have any faith whatsoever in Nurse being the right coach here for the long term. They’ve had an entire off-season to learn and adjust from what went wrong last season. No sane person could watch last year’s tape and come to the conclusion that nothing needs to change.

While I wouldn’t say I’m wildly optimistic about the Sixers heading into this season, I do firmly believe that even if George and Embiid look exactly the same next season as they did last season, the Sixers absolutely should not be as bad as they were in 2025. One could easily make the case that the Sixers have one of the best backcourts in the league, factoring in depth. Even if George and Embiid play a combined 60 games once again, it would be completely unacceptable for this team’s win total to wind up in the 20s. This is not a Process Era team; there is legitimate star talent on this roster, and if Nurse can adjust properly, I don’t think we will be watching another bottomfeeder. And if that is something they end up being, well, I think that should be the final word on the Nick Nurse era in Philly.

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Mike O’Connor is the best O’Connor in basketball writing. Previously of The Athletic, you can find Mike on Twitter @MOConnor_NBA. Mike’s writing is brought to you by Body Bio, supplements based on science, focusing on your gut and brain health.

It really is hard to describe what a whirlwind the last 12 months have been as a Sixer fan. At this time a year ago, I viewed the Sixers as being all-in on championship contention for the next 2-3 seasons. I figured that the “Big 3” of Tyrese Maxey, Paul George, and Joel Embiid would have at least a three year window. I thought of Jared McCain as a likely trade candidate whose career would max out as a bench player. While I didn’t think the Sixers’ long term future was necessarily bleak, I was certainly more excited by the idea of the present than what they could be in 3-5 years.

Nowadays, it’s hard not to wonder if the Sixers’ long term future is more exciting than the present – I wouldn’t blame anyone for being more intrigued by a potential McCain / V.J. Edgecombe-led team in five years than the 2025-26 Sixers.

So, given all of the uncertainty around the Sixers’ future, I figured it might be a good thought exercise to go through and rank which Sixers are most likely to stick around for the next three seasons. To be clear, I’m talking about the 2027-28 season – the final year of Paul George’s deal, and the last year of McCain’s rookie contract.

Here is a snapshot of their payroll from HoopsHype.

1. V.J. Edgecombe

Edgecombe takes the No. 1 spot here in large part due to the fact that any time a franchise invests a top-3 pick on a player, they’re not likely to give up on them within their first three years in the league; he would have to be a mega-bust in order for the Sixers to be looking to trade him in a few years. He’ll still be on his rookie deal at that point, making $12.2 million.

2. Jared McCain

This spot is where things start to get interesting. Tyrese Maxey is currently a better player and seems to have a far greater stature within the organization, but my decision to rank McCain here is essentially a bet against the current iteration of the Sixers’ roster – it’s really hard to envision a scenario in which George and Embiid continue to decline, yet the team still opts to keep building around Maxey and trade McCain. At this point, Maxey will be 27, and the Sixers will have almost no financial flexibility heading into the following season. It would unfortunately make a lot of sense to trade Maxey at some point, assuming McCain and Edgecombe develop as expected.

Of course, if everything were to go spectacularly well this season, McCain’s redundancy with Maxey could turn him into a trade piece. But sadly, I think the other end of the spectrum is far more likely – if George and Embiid prove unable to return to the players they once were, I think that over time, the hopelessness of the current roster, paired with how good McCain could end up being, will turn Maxey into a trade candidate.

3. Joel Embiid

I’m putting Joel here because I view his future as being boom-or-bust, and either one of those will lead to him remaining on the team – if he regains his MVP form, the Sixers will not trade him because he is too good; if his knee continues to be a major issue, the Sixers will not trade him because it will be impossible.

In the 2027-28 season, Joel will make $62 million, and will have a $67 million player option for the following year. Unfortunately, even if Embiid remains a shell of his former self, the best thing for the Sixers to do will be to eat that contract, rather than trade picks to get off of it or waive and stretch him – which they would almost certainly have to do in that situation.

4. Tyrese Maxey

Maxey gets the No. 4 spot here, primarily because there’s a solid chance that he is still the best player out of this entire group in a few years. If Edgecombe and McCain don’t develop, and Embiid and P.G. continue to decline, this franchise will very likely have nothing keeping it afloat besides Maxey.

I discussed scenarios above in which Maxey could end up getting traded, but the simple fact that he’s their only proven star who can be expected to stay healthy means that he can’t possibly be ranked any lower than No. 4.

5. Quentin Grimes

Grimes remains unsigned as of this writing, and recent reporting from Jake Fischer suggests that he may re-sign with the Sixers on a short-term deal. However, I still would put Grimes ahead of players like Paul George and Justin Edwards, simply due to the caliber of player we expect him to be at this point.

The case against Grimes would be his redundancy with Edgecombe and the fact that he seems desperate for a massive payday at some point, which the Sixers may be unable to give. However, one could just as easily envision a scenario in which he and Edgecombe prove they can share the floor, and that the Sixers are able to lock him up long term at a fair price.

6. Justin Edwards

Edwards will be in the final year of his very team-friendly contract in ‘27-28, making just $2.6 million. Honestly, I would hear out a case that he should be higher on this list, despite the fact that he may never be viewed as a true franchise cornerstone – his youth, value, and versatility make it such that the team will never have a pressing need to trade him.

That being said, I do think that Edwards could end up being a trade piece at some point in the future – if things start to feel a little crowded at the 2/3 spot, it might make sense to try to trade Edwards for a power forward who could help them round out their roster better. Still, I think it’s reasonable to expect Edwards to stick around on the Sixers through his current deal.

7. Adem Bona

Bona gets the seventh spot here simply due to the fact that he’ll be under contract and that he showed some promising flashes as a rookie. Oftentimes, these undersized hustle play big men turn out to be just flashes in the pan who will bounce around the league a while (see: Reed, Paul). But on the chance that Bona turns into a truly valuable rotation player, he has to get the No. 7 spot here.

8. Paul George

George gets the eighth spot here, just ahead of a bunch of players currently on the fringes of the roster. It’s very hard to imagine a scenario in which George and the Sixers are still in a happy marriage in 2028. If George lasts the entirety of his max contract on the Sixers – immediately after Tobias Harris lasted his entire max contract on the Sixers – I will be very, very surprised.

There are lots of things that could lead to George getting traded. If he plays well this season but the team still looks like it’s going nowhere, he could get traded to a contender. If he continues to decline, the Sixers will eventually be able to use him as salary filler once his deal turns into an expiring contract. Regardless, I think the least likely scenario (albeit still far from impossible) is that he’s still on the team in three years.

9. Johni Broome

Broome will be under (non-guaranteed) contract through the ‘27-’28 season, but I still am ranking him this low simply because I’m not all that high on him as a player. I am happy to be proven wrong if he pops!

T-10th: Trendon Watford, Jabari Walker, Dominick Barlow

Nothing against any of these guys – it’s just unlikely for two-ways and minimum contract guys to stick around in one place for a long period of time. Certainly, if Walker or Barlow flash some real development this year, they could earn a cheap, long term deal. But even then, chances are high they get waived or thrown into a trade at some point.

N/A: Kelly Oubre, Andre Drummond, Kyle Lowry, Eric Gordon

Simply no chance any of these guys are on the team in three years.

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Mike O’Connor is the best O’Connor in basketball writing. Previously of The Athletic, you can find Mike on Twitter @MOConnor_NBA. Mike’s writing is brought to you by Body Bio, supplements based on science, focusing on your gut and brain health.

Man, that was a heavy one. I went into Wednesday morning thinking that I knew just about everything there is to know about Joel Embiid. And yet, I still came out of that ESPN feature piece by Dotun Akintoye feeling emotionally exhausted. Embiid and his journey are so deep and so layered that even for me, as someone who has followed him closely for over 10 years, I felt overwhelmed reading it all.

Strangely, I found myself thinking about Allen Iverson at many points throughout the article. Embiid and Iverson are very different people, but they remind me very much of one another in a key way: they are extremely, profoundly human. You will find out things about both of those men that you think are major flaws, and then you keep digging and somehow feel even more charmed by them. You’ll see a jaded edge to their character that somehow makes them simultaneously difficult and great. You’ll hear about a seemingly unprovoked transgression that you think says something negative about them, but in fact serves as an effective self-protection mechanism, stemming from an unchosen wound from their past. Every time you think they are one thing, you’ll keep observing and find out they are in fact another.

My entire lifetime of Sixers fandom has been plagued by disappointment in terms of accomplishment, but I have to say that I do really feel lucky to have had the chance to follow two superstars so fascinating and enigmatic. They are flawed, yes, but many of their flaws just make for a more intimate connection with the fans. They are both tragic heroes in many ways.

That’s why, despite it being predictable, I was disappointed to see so many people turn this article into mere ammo for their agenda wars. If you went into this article just looking to clip out a few anecdotes and say “I told you so” about Embiid as a basketball player – for or against – I think you’re missing the point. This was a window into the human side of a guy with a journey unlike anyone else’s on the planet. It was about more than just his basketball legacy. It was about his humanity.

The thing that the article really crystallized for me was how chaotic, isolating, and overwhelming Embiid’s entire journey has been from the age of 15. I mean, he:

• Was suddenly regarded as a teenage basketball phenom overnight (so quickly that he couldn’t be sure he was actually good)

• Moved to another country alone

• Suffered a catastrophic injury that wouldn’t heal

• Was written off by his own team

• Tragically lost his brother

• Came back and became one of the greatest players to ever play

• Suffered another round of catastrophic injuries just as he was hitting his peak as a player

The article, unlike how some have characterized it, is not some flattering puff piece that goes through making excuses for Embiid. Even if you hadn’t known who Embiid was prior to reading that article, you would be able to read that article and find out the reasons why he has experienced many failures in his career, beyond just injury luck.

I’ve been someone who has shared a fair share of critiques of Embiid over the past few years (albeit with plenty of positive things, too), and I wouldn’t say that the article made me want to eat my words. But what I will say is that it made me understand. I understand why he wasn’t a vocal locker room leader. I understand why he’s shut off and distant from some members of the organization. I understand why he’s distrustful of everyone around him – he’s been proven right to feel that way, even if it has also hurt him in certain areas. I understand why he doesn’t insert himself into front office decisions. I understand how he got to the point where he feels like he can or should be late or absent to team events. Even though there are valid critiques for all of this behavior, and even if one could easily make the case that all of these things are the reasons he hasn’t accomplished as much as he could have, I just want to say that I understand. I get it. I empathize. And I still like and respect Joel as a person.

No one is fully equipped to deal with the life that Joel Embiid has had – both the challenges and the privileges. This article was an exploration of the coping mechanisms Joel used to get through it, and how those behaviors have been both effective and limiting for him later on in his career. Irrespective of whether you like or dislike him, or where you rank him as a player, I think that this article is just meant to help you understand. We frankly don’t get enough of that in today’s media ecosystem – content that somehow makes you see the athlete as less of a caricature and more of a human.

The last thing I’ll add here is that it really is rare for us to get this type of profile while someone’s career is still going on. The article didn’t reveal much into Embiid and the team’s outlook on his health beyond just general hope, but I did leave the piece thinking, “Man, if he ever does get healthy, figure some things out mentally, and lead the Sixers to a title, it would be one of the greatest sports stories ever.”

While the article gave a terrific picture of how Joel got to the point he’s at now, it also highlights how the future is a complete unknown. This might be it – he might never get healthy. But if he does, and he leads the team to the mountaintop, there really are no words to describe what a crazy, inspirational, story that will be, despite some of the chapters being very unpleasant. Joel often says that his life and career is like a movie; this article made me hope even more that there’s a happy ending.

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Mike O’Connor is the best O’Connor in basketball writing. Previously of The Athletic, you can find Mike on Twitter @MOConnor_NBA. Mike’s writing is brought to you by Body Bio, supplements based on science, focusing on your gut and brain health.

With the exception of the Quentin Grimes signing — which by all accounts, the Sixers still intend on completing — it appears as if the Sixers’ off-season is just about over. According to a report from Tony Jones of The Athletic, the Sixers are “essentially done” with their summer moves. So, it appears we are about to enter into a very, very long August as we await the start of training camp.

I expected the Sixers to be pretty quiet this summer, but this is a step shy of what I thought they would do. While I approve of the Edgecombe pick and I like some of their moves around the edges, I think it’s worth discussing the fact that yet another off-season has come and gone without the Sixers A) adequately addressing their biggest needs, or B) making a marginal trade that helps their future outlook in some way. The Sixers, in fact, have not made a single trade this off-season.

They are obviously limited to a considerable degree by Quentin Grimes’ restricted free agency, but I can’t help but notice that they once again sat back as other teams took advantage of the opportunity to add cheap, young talent in buy-low situations that the Sixers could theoretically have jumped in on – Cam Whitmore and Jay Huff were traded for peanuts this summer, and both would have filled a need (to varying degrees) for the Sixers.

Now, are Jay Huff and Cam Whitmore going to become high level rotation players on winning teams? Probably not. But if you practically never take chances on players like these, you never give yourself the opportunity to find cheap, young depth, and find yourself in a scenario similar to last off-season, where the Sixers’ depth at key positions was so poor that they had to give multi-year deals to washed veterans like Andre Drummond and Eric Gordon. The same could be said of the P.J. Tucker and Danuel House, Jr. signings before them.

This cycle of rarely taking buy-low chances on young players or establishing cheap depth at key positions, and then panicking and overpaying washed veterans, has plagued the Sixers for, frankly, the entire Embiid era. It just frustrates me to no end that the Sixers are never the team trading for the Jay Huffs of the world; they are in fact the team that gives away players like Isaiah Joe, and then wonders two years later why they have no shooting off the bench, and proceeds to trade for Buddy Hield and then give a two-year deal to Eric Gordon.

As always, I have to caveat this by saying that Morey and co. have done some really good stuff on the margins, like drafting Jared McCain, signing Justin Edwards, etc. etc. Even trading for Jared Butler last winter could, I suppose, qualify as the type of move I’m talking about. But even then, the Sixers let him walk in part so that they retain Kyle Lowry, who is completely unplayable at this point in his career. If McCain and Maxey ever both miss a game at any point this season, and the Sixers find themselves unable to dribble the ball across half court, they won’t have to wonder how the roster got to that point.

One of my repeated criticisms of Daryl Morey throughout his tenure has been the fact that most of his wins have come through simply making the obviously correct decision that any competent general manager would make, and that there has been a real absence of stringing together marginal wins that sneakily set the team up well for the future. This summer was no exception. They knew they had a gaping, catastrophically big hole at power forward, and they filled it with one minimum contract (Watford), one questionable-looking second round pick (Johni Broome), and two two-way players (Jabari Walker and Dominick Barlowe).

Again, I like Watford, and there’s a chance that he renders all of these concerns about the roster irrelevant. But even in the event that that happens, I still think my criticisms about not taking enough bites at the apple – or at least, enough appropriately sized bites at the apple – would stand true.

Watford and Walker are not totally unknown commodities. Walker has played over 3000 NBA minutes, and couldn’t land a full NBA contract on the open market. Still, maybe a breakout will come for one of them. Or, maybe we’ll be sitting here next off-season in the exact same spot, with the Sixers still desperately needing a true starting power forward, as they proceed to give the full MLE to some 36-year-old in order to patch a hole that they should have been taking real swings on for multiple years prior.

All in all, this off-season feels quite a bit like 2018, 2021, and 2023 – which is to say, they didn’t really do anything! I shudder to think of how I’d be feeling right now had they lost the pick in the draft lottery and not been able to draft Edgecombe.

To be clear, I’m not trying to crush Morey or accuse the front office of any gross incompetence.

Perhaps the best defense of the Sixers’ lack of moves is the fact that the team has no idea what they will get from Joel Embiid in terms of his health. Embiid, by the way, has reportedly yet to resume on-court activities, which is startling considering that arthroscopic surgeries like the one he had tend to have 6-week recovery timelines. Additionally, one could make the case that if the Sixers feel that next year’s team is worth investing in, they could fill their power forward spot pretty easily during the season via trade – someone like Dorian Finney-Smith, for example, is a starter-level player and was traded for three second round picks last December.

Still, I think the power forward hole will impact this team more severely than many are anticipating. If one of their minimum or two-way signings doesn’t pop, you won’t even have the chance to fairly evaluate whether this team is worth investing in, because its flaws could end up being so severe that it’d be impossible to judge what they could be without them. Even aside from just winning games, I’d love for the young backcourt rotation to be able to play for a realistically sized basketball team, and not have to be demoralized and forced to play unnatural roles because of the team’s inability to rebound or protect the rim. I’d like for V.J. Edgecombe’s early development to take place with him playing his natural role, rather than in comically small lineups where he is playing small forward next to a 6’8” power forward and a 6’9” center.

Oh well. I feel like I write this same column nearly every off-season and trade deadline – it’s not like they made any terrible mistakes, I just don’t think they succeeded on the margins. I don’t mean to keep repeating myself; I blame the Sixers for continually repeating themselves. If they get extremely lucky with their signings this summer, or pull off an in-season rotation depth trade, I’ll happily eat my words. But that hasn’t happened yet, so I feel like I should be safe to start planning out my “Well the Sixers Stood Pat Again” trade deadline column.

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Mike O’Connor is the best O’Connor in basketball writing. Previously of The Athletic, you can find Mike on Twitter @MOConnor_NBA. Mike’s writing is brought to you by Body Bio, supplements based on science, focusing on your gut and brain health.

Free agency is set to begin Monday night (June 30) at 6:00 p.m., and while the Sixers don’t have anywhere near the flexibility they had last summer, they still have at least four open roster spots, a $5.7 million taxpayer mid -evel exception, and some tradeable salary and future draft picks if they’re feeling frisky.

As I’ve discussed countless times, acquiring more front court depth – specifically at power forward – should be the Sixers’ biggest priority from here on out. Here are 10 potential options, from premium trade targets to bargain bin free agents, who might make sense for the Sixers.

Before we get into the potential targets, I think it’s important to address the question many of you are probably asking yourselves: why would the Sixers ever trade anything of value for one of these players given the uncertainty around the health of Joel Embiid?

It’s a fair question: If Embiid’s knee is toast, trading a future pick(s) for a player that doesn’t help you escape mediocrity may be looked back on as a mistake.

With that said, I think it’s important to keep in mind the history of both this ownership group and of Daryl Morey. While I don’t know for sure, I highly doubt that ownership, less than a decade removed from The Process, with the league now in a much different place, is happy with the idea of kickstarting another deep, long rebuild. The Sixers just had the third pick in the draft, and Josh Harris is paying an exorbitant amount of money to all three of the roster, front office and coaching staff; I doubt that he wants another season just like last year.

Secondly, when Morey was last faced with similar circumstances in the late 2000s in Houston, as Tracy McGrady and Yao Ming’s careers flamed out due to injuries, he did not bottom out – in fact, the team never even had a losing season. He made a bunch of smart moves on the margins, positioned them to trade for a star player, and eventually cashed in his chips by trading for James Harden. It wouldn’t surprise me one bit — especially with the new lottery rules — if Morey believes that the best path forward is to build through the middle and hit a bunch of singles in order to get this team back into contention.

Lastly, it’s important to keep in mind that trading something of value for a player is never a bad idea if you think the value of that player will go up in the future. If Morey sees a player who costs a first-round pick now who he thinks can develop into a player worth two first-round picks in a year or two, he’d be foolish not to make that trade. If there’s a wing version of the Quentin Grimes trade out there, that’s a no-brainer.

Anyway, let’s get into the players.

Trade Targets

Cameron Johnson, 6’9”, Brooklyn Nets

Johnson is stuck on a rebuilding team in Brooklyn, which has fueled a lot of speculation as to whether he might be available for trade, but for the Sixers’ sake, consider this the most unlikely option of the bunch. Johnson will make $21 million next season, so trading for him would likely have to involve packaging Andre Drummond, Kelly Oubre, and Eric Gordon (with each of them opting into player options), as well as probably multiple first round draft picks.

While Johnson would be an awesome fit here, it really just doesn’t make a ton of sense to trade for him at this point, given the issues he would pose from a salary cap perspective, as well as the fact that Johnson is 29, and his contract expires after the 2027 season – so it’s not as if the Sixers could talk themselves into there being untapped potential here that would allow them to turn around in a year or two and flip him for more than they paid.

P.J. Washington, 6’8”, Dallas Mavericks

Washington was a key piece for the Mavs in their 2024 Finals run, but since trading for Anthony Davis (with the intention to play him at the four), as well as drafting Cooper Flagg, it’s worth wondering whether he might be available for trade. There simply aren’t enough minutes to go around in Dallas, and the odd man out is not going to be the No. 1 overall pick or the superstar that they just traded for.

Washington has a few factors working in his favor that make him a more realistic trade target than Johnson – he’s only 26, he makes $14 million instead of $21 million, and he likely carries a lower price tag. I could see the price simply being the 2028 Clippers pick and salary filler.

The fact that he’s on an expiring contract is a bit of a concern, but non-star players don’t seem to change teams in free agency as frequently as they used to. The Sixers would have his Bird rights, so they would be able to re-sign him regardless of what apron they are in.

Washington may have hit his final form as a player, but having him in an offensive system with Maxey and McCain might allow him to showcase some skills as a short roller that he hasn’t yet been able to display so far in his career. If the Sixers do trade for him and re-sign him at a reasonable number, his value isn’t likely to go down any time soon.

Tari Eason, 6’8” or Jabari Smith Jr., 6’11”, Houston Rockets

It’s certainly possible that Houston goes into next season with the roster as-is, but they have sort of the reverse problem that the Sixers have in that they have a glut of power forwards and very few playable guards. Additionally, both Eason and Smith are on the final year of their rookie deals, and it’s unclear if the organization has the stomach to pay both players beyond this season.

If the Sixers could manage to snag either one of these guys – perhaps in a 3-team trade where the Sixers send assets to another team, which sends a guard to Houston – that would go a long way in balancing the fit of both rosters. And of course, the fact that both players are so young, and that Smith in particular may have more dimensions left to add to his game, makes this even more appealing.

Herb Jones, 6’8”, New Orleans Pelicans

It’s very unclear what the Pelicans are hoping to accomplish this off-season. It appeared as though they were eager to jump into a rebuild, but then they traded their unprotected first round pick for next season on draft night to move up to select Derik Queen. Trading Jones wouldn’t make a ton of sense for a team looking to make noise next year, but that being said, if for whatever reason they don’t view him as a key part of their future the Sixers should jump all over it.

Jones makes a ton of sense as a win-now target, and while I don’t see him expanding his game very much, his value isn’t likely to go down as long as he remains healthy and under contract at a reasonable number. He’d be a tremendous fit on the current roster, and would complement the young core of guards extremely well.

Given that he has multiple years left on his current deal, it would likely cost more than just one first round pick, but that’s a price I’d be willing to pay if he’s available.

Jarred Vanderbilt, 6’8”, Los Angeles Lakers

OK, we’re starting to get to the lower tier of players here. I still really like the concept of Vanderbilt, but he’s dealt with lots of injuries over the past two years and has not managed to make a consistent impact since the 2023 playoffs. The Lakers also have a surplus of power forwards, and it would likely behoove them to get off of one of them if they can.

Oubre, Drummond, and a second-round pick or two for Vanderbilt makes a good bit of sense for both rosters, especially considering the Lakers’ dire need for centers.

Maxi Kleber, 6’10”, Los Angeles Lakers

Kleber, like Vanderbilt, is stuck in a logjam of Lakers power forwards and has struggled with health issues in recent years. Entering his mid-30s on an expiring contract, I can’t imagine he has any positive value. This is the type of deal the Sixers could swing as a pure salary swap in hopes that Kleber acts as a short-term stopgap at the four spot. If he’s totally washed, he just becomes filler to be used at the deadline.

Free agent targets

To reiterate: the only tools the Sixers have available to them in free agency are minimum contracts and their $5.7 million mid-level exception. Of course, I would love to see them use that on Guerschon Yabusele, but it’s unclear if he will be available at that price, or if the Sixers even have the appetite to use their full mid-level exception. In some previous years, they have opted not to use their MLE altogether. Here are some other guys who they might consider with their resources available.

Marvin Bagley III

Bagley should be gettable on a minimum, and to restate something I said in my previous article, he absolutely stinks – but unlike most of the Sixers’ stinky signings last summer, he’s big, tall, athletic, and stinks.

In all seriousness, Bagley at least rebounds at an above-average rate for his position, and his ability to be a lob threat in the pick and roll would be a welcomed dynamic in the Sixers’ front court. He’s worth taking a shot on with a minimum deal, and the fact that he’s a former top prospect is something that Morey has consistently valued in buy-low situations throughout his career.

Jake LaRavia

LaRavia has the most perimeter skills of anyone mentioned here – he’s a ready and willing shooter (37 percent for his career) with some real passing juice and a half decent handle. He likely would require the MLE, if he’s even available for that.

At just 23, having yet to solidify his place in the league, the Sixers could offer him a combination of playing time and chance at competing that many other teams could not. If they can come to terms on a 3-year MLE deal, I’d consider that a win for the Sixers.

Trey Lyles

Lyles has quietly played a big role for Sacramento the past few years, including in 2023 when they had the best offense in the entire NBA. His 3-point shooting has stabilized after some struggles early in his career (36 percent over the past three seasons), he rebounds at a decent rate, and he’s an adequate passer.

He’s likely to get something above the minimum, so I’d rather spend the MLE on Yabu, but if the Sixers do lose Yabusele, Lyles is a solid replacement in a 15-20 minutes per game role.

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Mike O’Connor is the best O’Connor in basketball writing. Previously of The Athletic, you can find Mike on Twitter @MOConnor_NBA. Mike’s writing is brought to you by Body Bio, supplements based on science, focusing on your gut and brain health.