Trading For D’Angelo Russell Is A Bad Idea
By Josh Wilson
While the Los Angeles Lakers making D’Angelo Russell available on the trading block seems like a good thing for the Philadelphia 76ers, they should be careful about making any calls for him.
The Philadelphia 76ers Twitter world awoke quite quickly when news leaked that D’Angelo Russell of the Los Angeles Lakers was on the trading block. Russell was plan A for general manager Sam Hinkie and the Sixers this offseason, so adding him to their plan B Jahlil Okafor seems to be an intriguing plan. Although the idea of it is certainly entertaining, it’s not a sure thing that this is a truly good plan.
Russell being on the block doesn’t mean the Lakers are giving him away for dirt cheap. They would be dumb to be shopping him around for nothing, since he was taken second overall in this year’s draft class, which is shaping up to be an impressive one.
What this means for Philly is if they desire to get him, they’re going to have to give up something. That something probably won’t be short of Jahlil Okafor or the Sixers first round pick this season.
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Some might think it’s still a good trade. There’s a decent population behind the motion to trade Jahlil Okafor at the deadline in order to plan for the future. Most have concluded that the team can’t balance all three of their top-tier big men (Jahlil Okafor, Nerlens Noel, and Joel Embiid) on a competitive team, so some have also concluded that Okafor is the best trade pawn since he currently will yield the most value.
Despite that, I believe moving Okafor for anything, much less an unproven point guard and an imaginary college prospect, is a bad idea. Okafor is one of the most proven players from the past few year’s of the draft already, and he’s just over halfway into his first season in the league. He’s averaging double digit points and nearly double digit rebounds. He’s improving on his foul shooting as well as his defense. The scoring ceiling for this young big man is undefinable at the moment, and as much as we can project for Russell and a top draft pick, we haven’t seen real evidence of anything for what the Sixers could get back for Okafor.
Russell is the only part of a trade with the Lakers that has any NBA experience, and his experience could be called lackluster. Although some would argue that Russell has been misused, and I would certainly agree, he hasn’t shown he can pass all that well. And if he was brought to the team, he would find himself behind in the rotation with Ish Smith still in the mix.
Along with Okafor the Sixers could barter to get the Lakers to unprotect their first round draft pick, which seems to be getting closer and closer to being the projected number one overall pick. This would give the Sixers two top-3 projected first round picks, which is incredible, but they would be giving up Jahlil Okafor, possibly a historic scorer, for two unproven draft prospects.
I don’t care how good Ben Simmons or Brandon Ingram have looked at college. The chance that the lottery sways in the Sixers favor to give them the number 1 and number 2 pick is slim, and both of those guys are unproven in the NBA.
Okafor, on the other hand, is a proven scorer who can work against some of the veteran defenders of the NBA. That is something we know for sure already.