Milwaukee Bucks
Second is the Milwaukee Bucks. Just an hour drive from Chicago, the hometown hero narrative could kick in here as well, but it’s a bit more of a stretch with this scenario. Still, I’m sure Jah would be buying his hometown family a lot more tickets to games if he played this close to home.
The Bucks are in a tricky situation with their centers right now. Miles Plumlee is a free agent, and it’s not clear if the team wants to make him the center of the future. The experiment with Greg Monroe didn’t play out as well as either party had hoped it would, and because of that, the Sixers and Bucks should turn any situation involving Okafor going to Milwaukee into a three team trade.
You can’t have Monroe and Okafor on the same team, so the Bucks could find a party interested in Monroe, send him there, and then have that team send a player in return to the Sixers. The Bucks don’t really have any players that look like they would be good options for Philly, since they would have a hard time parting with players like Giannis Antetokounmpo.
If the Bucks would part with Khris Middleton (and that’s a huge if) that could be a solid pickup for Philadelphia. Middleton had a career-best year this season, scoring 18.2 points per game, grabbing 3.8 rebounds, and dishing out 4.2 assists.
As I talked about with Ti Windisch on his latest episode of Timeout With Ti, Middleton on a contract for $14 million a year is, “highway robbery,” according to Ti. If the Sixers could somehow pry him away from the Bucks, it would be outstanding, because his halfway-decent 3-point shooting (averaged just under 40 percent from beyond the arc this season) is what the Sixers need on the wings.
If not, the Sixers could always get a player from a third team that will have to be involved for Greg Monroe anyway.
Next: Houston Rockets