Philly Front Office

This looks like a great trade for the pivoting Clippers and here are the details. The Clippers are getting the Pacers unprotected 2029 1st. They are also possibly getting the Pacers 2026 1st with crazy protections: 1-4 and 10-30. So, unless it lands 5-9, the Clippers get the Pacers 2031 unprotected first. That’s basically protections both ways in case Indiana wins the lottery or gets good all of a sudden.

The Clippers now lose $20m in salary from their books until 27-28. This opens back up significant cap room just when it’s bad for the Sixers. They also now have items to trade, things they did not have last week. That combined with getting Darius Garland earlier in the week significantly downgrades the picks the Sixers are getting from the Clippers in 28 and 29. Yay!

The Sixers have traded Eric Gordon to the Memphis Grizzlies for a 2032 2nd round pick swap and the rights to Justinian Jessup. WHOA. There is a lot to unpack here!!! Just kidding. This is a straight salary dump of a move for the Sixers, but at least we do not have to send out a bunch of 2nd rounders like in previous years. This stinks.

In a vacuum, this is fine. Getting rid of extra salary who doesn’t play for basically nothing is a win. The problem is the increasing likelihood that the Sixers are only trying to duck the tax at the deadline rather than improve the team. They needed to do this because they inexplicably signed Eric Gordon to a 2 year contract last year only to make a deal with him where he would opt out of that deal and resign for the league minimum. That’s why they had to get rid of him in the first place. Gordon has played in 6 games this season for 74 total minutes.

The impetus behind the move is drifting far enough below the tax line to sign both Dominick Barlow and Jabari Walker to standard contracts. We have less than an hour to go here, but this is looking like one of the more depressing deadlines of the last…ummm…ever…

Oh right, Justinian! He’s 6’6 and went to Boise State but has been playing internationally, most recently for Bayern Munich. At best, he will be traded in another version of this same trade in the future.

After a long bidding war and much flirtation, the Bucks and Giannis are staying married until at least the summer. There are two possibilities here: either the Bucks didn’t like the offers they were receiving OR they had no intention of trading him in the first place. Let’s take a look…

The teams best positioned to land Giannis were the Spurs, Thunder, and Rockets but none of them seemed to be involved at all. Instead, the Bucks were mostly dealing with the Wolves, Knicks, and Heat. All 3 of these teams were limited in both draft picks and young talent. A Sixers deal of 3 draft picks, VJ Edgecombe, and Paul George’s contract would have probably gotten a deal done. None of those other 3 could get near that. By waiting until the summer, teams will necessarily have better offers. Why? Because they will now have access to picks from 2033 AND restricted ones from 2026. More teams will be able to offer more picks or better picks, simple as that.

HOWEVER, the big variable here is how the Bucks do in the lottery. This gets weird, but the Pelicans have the right to swap picks with the Bucks. The Hawks then get the most favorable of the Bucks or Pelicans picks. If when the dust clears the Bucks have a top 3 pick, they could be looking at one of this draft’s top players in Darryn Peterson, Cameron Boozer, or AJ Dybantsa. All 3 are considered elite prospects and could change the outlook for the entire franchise. The Bucks would then either trade the pick to get Giannis another star in Milwaukee (like Lebron did with Kevin Love and Andrew Wiggins once upon a time), OR the Bucks could keep the pick and pair him with Giannis. Either way, this would be the Bucks last stand. If the pingpong balls do not land right, the auction begins in earnest.

The Knicks are sending Dalen Terry, two 2nd rounders, and cash to the Pelicans for the point guard. Alvarado is an incredibly annoying backup guard who will do nothing but improve a team he’s on. He’s like TJ McConnell in that you think he can’t do anything, but he is absolutely going to outwork you every time. He can even hit 3s at a reasonable clip. His contract is $4.5m with a player option for the same amount next year. Peanuts.

WTF Sixers??? This is a great move for a team like the Knicks and he would have been even better for a team like the Sixers. Since we lost TJ MCConnell, we have not had a guy like this to show everyone exactly what they should be doing all the time. The last week I kept going over to TJ’s contract page on Spotrac but could not rationalize his $11m cap hit. Well Alvarado makes less than half that!!! Goddamnit Daryl, you have 2 hours to not make us all hate you.

The Bulls get four 2nds and Rob Dillingham in the deal. Dillingham’s time in Minny is over before it ever really started. The Wolves made a huge play for him in the 2024 draft, trading a 2030 swap and a 2031 unprotected 1st to Spurs for the right to draft him. It didn’t work out. Now he goes to the Bulls where he should finally get some run.

Dosunmu has become a deadly shooter (.451) from 3 for the Bulls this season on a decent 4.3 attempts per game, all while really being known for his defense. This trade either takes the Bulls out of the Giannis sweepstakes or is actually a sneaky good move to fortify a team that expects to lose some key players in an even bigger move. Either way, a solid piece of business for a team without many ways of improving itself for a playoff run.

Why do we care? Dosunmu always seemed like the perfect role player for a good team. Well, that is exactly what he is about to become, just not for the Sixers. It’s funny that this is exactly the type of move the Process Sixers would have made with Minny. Dillingham is a damaged asset right now with clear talent but little opportunity. Would have been perfect 13 years ago.

The Kuminga-Warriors saga finally came to an end last night after what seems to have been a forever feud that never really made sense. Is Kuminga good? If yes, why didn’t they play him? If no, why was he still there and why did they pay him $24m? The answer was supposedly to trade him. Of course, now that they finally did, it clearly wasn’t worth it. He essentially went to the Hawks in a swap of bad salaries. Buddy Hield went with him while Kristaps Porzingis goes to Golden State. Porzingis has basically missed the whole season with odd injuries and isn’t exactly someone the Warriors can depend on down the stretch.

Why do we care? This likely takes the Warriors out of the Giannis sweepstakes for one. With the Sixers on the outside looking in there, Morey’s job would be to try to pick productive scraps out of that trade; someone like Jaden McDaniels from the Wolves or Andrew Wiggins from the Heat (though their salaries are tough). The Hawks now have a plethora of essentially the same player too. They have all the wings!!! Can the Sixers have some of them please?

• Lonzo Ball to the Jazz…temporarily
  • The Cavs still had two 2nds left in their holster and they sent both of them to the Jazz to get rid of Lonzo. Fans often yell about owners being cheap and I am in no way defending the Cavs terrible human being of an owner, but the trade saves him apparently $65m in tax. The NBAs financial penalties are doing work right now. If the Cavs cannot shed another $4m in salary they will have their 2033 1st round pick frozen for draft purposes. The Jazz will not hold on to Lonzo. He is a great comeback story, but he is also having a terrible year. I think it is expected that he ends up in Charlotte with his brother, but he’d also be a solid backup PG for the Sixers. Always wanted him and his connectivity passing.
• Coby White to the Hornets, Sexton to the Bulls
  • Bulls fans are probably breathing a sigh of relief that management was not planning on giving a ton of money to White who is exactly the guy they usually overpay: good, but not great. In the deal, Collin Sexton goes to Chicago. He now has 4 straight years of excellent shooting from deep and plays 1000 mph all the time. Getting him to be our 6th man punch off the bench would have been great, but his $19m salary is very much in the way. He would need to be bought out for my dreams to become a reality.
• CP3 to the Raptors
  • Chris Paul has finally been freed from his odd purgatory in LA. This is the opposite of how final seasons are supposed to be. The Raptors will likely end up buying him out, setting up one final (and for real this time) location for the Pointgod. All 3 of these point guards can’t go to the Hornets, right??? The Sixers really need to get one.

Anyone who has been watching the Sixers this season had a pretty good idea of what the team thought of Jared McCain. After starting the season hurt, he has barely played lately. Add that to a less than glowing offseason review from Daryl Morey and you could tell he was not long for the red, white, and blue. He goes to the Thunder for a 2026 1st (from the Rockets), and three 2nds (OKC in 2028, Milwaukee 2028, and a 2027 from the most favorable of the Thunder, Rockets, Pacers, and Heat).

There are a few early thoughts on this:

• They did not think a backcourt of McCain with VJ Edgecombe and Tyrese Maxey had any kind of future
• This might mean that Quentin Grimes has a better shot of sticking around
• There had to be serious haggling over pick involved. It is very interesting that the Sixers went for the Houston pick as opposed to the Sixers own pick that is still haunting us from the Al Horford trade so many years ago. The different is currently 8 selections
• The Sixers can now trade up to 4 1sts in a deal
• McCain was making $4.2m so this dips the Sixers around $3m under the luxury tax threshold and around $5.2m under the 1st apron.

More to come later…

We have another blockbuster on our hands. The Wizards, sick of being irrelevant are acquiring all the damaged former All-Stars they can find. First, Trae Young and now Anthony Davis (and D’Angelo Russell). They aren’t even giving up that much. One of the picks is from the Thunder this year which will likely be around 30, the other is a Top-20 protected 2030 Warriors pick (they also picked up three 2nds). To cap off the Doncic trade with this move is just abysmal. Good on the Wizards for going for relevance without giving up their young core.

As for the Sixers, there was little chance they were interested in Davis, but getting throw-ins Marvin Bagley and D’Angelo Russell were somewhat possible. Kris Middleton also moved in the deal and will likely be bought out to pursue a better situation. The Sixers could be interested. We also currently own the Wizards’ 2030 2nd rounder, but that’s a bit far to worry about.

This trade continues my earlier point that once moves start getting made, they lead to more moves. With Davis off the market, other teams like the Pistons and…oh shit we just traded Jared McCain…

Four major deals went down and they all affect the Sixers in some way. Let’s take a look:

• Clippers trade James Harden to the Cavs for Darius Garland and a 2nd round pick
  • Harden again wanted a better guaranteed contract and forced his way out of another preferred situation to get it. We care about this move because the Sixers own the Clippers 1st round pick in 2028 and swap rights in 2029, and we need the Clippers to be bad. Before the move, LA planned to have enough cap space in the summer of 2027 to lure two max level free agents. However, now with Garland and his near $45m salary on the books that season, the Clippers only have room for one. This week I wrote about these two picks and the debate over whether it is better for the Clippers to have money or talent. Since free agency is not nearly the best way to team build anymore, I’d rather them sit on their cash and have no one take it. At the same time though, Garland is a notoriously injury riddled player who the Cavs just had to pay to get rid of. I think those picks are burning a hole in Daryl’s pocket either way.
• Celtics trade Anfernee Simons to the Bulls for Nikola Vucevic
  • The Celtics made this move to lower their luxury tax bill even further while also giving them a legitimate starting center. While they lose Simons, who has been a legitimate scorer off their bench, they do bring in former Sixer Vucevic who gives them a weapon we will have trouble with. Not only does Vuc notoriously kill the Sixers, he does it in a way that is particularly difficult for Embiid to handle. He shoots around .400 from 3 and gets a ton of rebounds. Goddamnit. Throw in that this is a perfect pivot for Boston concerning the likely return of Jayson Tatum and I just groan and roll me eyes out of my goddamn head. Why is this so frustrating? Because you KNOW that the Celtics and Sixers are going to play in the 1st round as the 3-6 game. It is destiny. Boston, where all good things go to die.
• Grizzlies trade Jaren Jackson Jr to the Jazz for three 1sts and a slew of players
  • This one came out of nowhere. Everyone knew the Grizz were looking to offload Ja Morant, but JJJ figured to stick around into the next era of Memphis basketball. Nope. This only affects the Sixers tangentially. Not only does it make a Morant move more likely, but it makes all other moves more likely. Sometimes a trade deadline needs a spark to get people in the mood to trade. That sounds silly, but we saw a few more moves go down right after this one. There could be more to come. Also, if the Sixers have interest in anyone on Memphis, the door’s open.
• Wolves trade Mike Conley to the Bulls, Jaden Ivey also goes to Chicago
  • I almost didn’t include this one, but the Sixers need a backup PG. They need someone competent to come in and give about 10 minutes of leadership and that’s just not Kyle Lowery. Granted, it might not be Mike Conley anymore either considering his stats have fallen off a cliff this season, but a minimum deal for the 1x highest paid player ever wouldn’t be a bad idea. The Bulls have already said that they do not plan on rostering Conley and will either trade him or look to buy him out.