While the priorities right now seem to be aging the Philadelphia 76ers’ roster, that strategy can cause more harm than good
Despite coming off the league worst 10-72 record, despite holding the youngest roster in the NBA, and despite the debut of up to five new rookie faces on the roster as a result of the three first round picks from the 2016 NBA Draft as well as the healthy debut of Joel Embiid and international arrival of Dario Saric, there is only one thing we truly know about the 2016-2017 NBA Philadelphia 76ers.
They are unknowns.
It’s not the fact that the team is just a gathering of NBA hopefuls with small amounts of talent. The roster is currently filled with very talented but young NBA players, players who were brought to the team with the focus on talent upside alone, and with little regard to team needs. That youthful roster was placed at a disadvantage
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The other complication? The team does not have a core of five or so 4-7 year veterans on the roster to smooth out the spikes and valleys of performance. The team spent the 2015-2016 season learning by on the job training. And it showed.
Now, fresh from all that first hand experience, the team is lining up to make another go of it, and that’s good news. You see, despite all the bluster and whispers, This Philadelphia 76ers may have been the worst record of the 2016-2017 season, but there are many factors which should prevent another repeat this season.
Next: Help is on the Way
Help is on the Way
With up to five rookies arriving to swell the Philadelphia 76ers roster and the loss to free agency, the team will find voids at the point guard position ( Ish Smith) and power forward position (Elton Brand). But the team will be bringing in center Joel Embiid from rehabilitation, and power forward Dario Saric to the NBA following a very successful regular and post season with Anadolu Efes of the Turkish Basketball Super League. And then, there is the top pick of the NBA draft.
Sir Charles In Charge
But unknowns means two things. You cannot predict what the Philadelphias 76ers’ players’ floors will be, but you are also just as limited in predicting players ceilings. There’s the rub. If we cannot know what the upside is of our players, we are assuredly risking surrendering too much value for too little in return. Like any economic system, certainty comes at a premium, and a premium is one the Philadelphia 76ers can ill afford to pay now, or for the foreseeable future.
Don't think you can talk about #sixers as team of unknowns and not acknowledge how much unknown still exists in Jahlil Okafor's game/impact.
— Derek Bodner (@DerekBodnerNBA) May 29, 2016
And so, verbiage, statements, and even innuendos by the current executives may strive to bolster our experience and eliminate the uncertainty from this team, but that comes at the price of eliminating the potential. That’s the premium the Philadelphia 76ers will pay to pursue veteran players on a wholesale strategy. Potential trading partners need simply to wait, let the Sixers discount the players to a ridiculously low level, and then trade a known lower value for the potential for a much higher valued rookie or two-year player. They’ve heard the same narrative as we have, and they’ve been licking their chops. The Philadelphia 76ers won trades because they were the team that could wait for their return. The new regime will not.
That’s one sure way to undo all the positives that Sam Hinkie had bequeathed to the team after his resignation. Trade it away.
Next: Measure Twice, Trade Once
Measure Twice, Trade Once
In the haste to add certainty to the Philadelphia 76ers roster, a minimum level of veteran presence must be attained which will act as the “glue” to the team. The efforts of new president Bryan Colangelo must certainly key upon trading valuable players in the process.
The likelihood of attracting premier NBA free agents has all but been ruled out by Colangelo himself, and the rapidly escalating NBA salary cap places free dollars into the hands of many NBA teams this year. Dollars alone will no longer win the hearts of impact free agents this year. So the Philadelphia 76ers will likely pursue the trade channel as the means to transform this roster.
Valuable players whose potentials are unknown place a great risk to the Sixers in any exchange – we may be trading a future NBA All-Star simply for an overpriced veteran. Before we can assume any trade, our confidence level of what we are trading away must be greater than a 50/50 coin flip. If we take a chance on our player’s potential, that would cripple the building process of this team. Losing value now simply depletes the roster of potential. In the current uncertainty of what and who we have, any effort to rush that process along seems doomed before it starts.
The team roster is a moving target right now. The new faces to the roster could ignite a cohesion in the lineup that has been absent in the past just from the distinction of true roles, and not an experimental approach to this roster. But the wrong assemblage of players could prove to be a disastrous setback. It would be wiser to learn that our pieces remain incompatible than to set up a trade of players who would never gel together on our roster.
Next: Trade Yes, Surrender No
Trade Yes, Surrender No
Now, that is not to say that a mind blowing offer would not require some immediate assessment, particularly if the pieces offered had a similar potential to upside as anything the Sixers have offered on their side of the deal. But the premise with seeking veterans is the gathering of “knowns” to this roster. Since any pieces commanding trade interest from the Sixers will involve potential NBA starters, the Sixers must expect at a minimum a starter from another team with All Star potential.
NBA teams do not typically line up to surrender that talent level in a trade. We do know that NBA teams continue to play in a center-centric league, and that the Philadelphia 76ers have cornered the market on centers who are both young and roster impacting and potentially available.
But there is no reason to rush this along. Knowledge is power, and the longer the Sixers can delay any trades is all the more knowledge they can generate over the players they currently have. While many of us would love the pairing of Brandon Ingram and Ben Simmons on this roster, the cost may be something that does not thrill the fan base in the future.
Sam Hinkie knew the intrinsic value of his players and constantly remain attuned with that value as the true value tracked with the market value of players. When he detected a huge difference between his assessed value and that of public opinion, he pulled the trigger on a trade.
Next: Not Knowing About Joel Embiid Is Reason To Deal Or Keep
That’s the goal now. The team should pause before executing a trade from which there is no going back. We can’t suddenly “make it right” if we surrender two of our three centers, only to find that other teams are succeeding in post season due to the contribution of one of the players obtained from the Philadelphia 76ers.
Time is on our side. We should not be so eager to shed our players who have potential to be NBA stars someday, in hopes to acquire another potential NBA star. Bryan Colangelo is eager to leave his mark on the destiny of the Philadelphia 76ers. The risk at this point in time is not doing too little, but in doing too much with too little information.