Early Thursday morning, it was reported that shooting guard Danny Green had agreed to re-sign with the Sixers on a two-year, $20 million deal.
Before he did agree to re-sign, there was a lot of anxiety about his potential departure building up. Georges Niang’s signing did dip into the Sixers’ mid-level exception. While we don’t know for sure, it does appear that the the front office used Green’s early bird rights to re-sign him, with Niang getting partial MLEL
Using Green’s bird rights is important because it allows the team to not be hard-capped. That’s crucial for flexibility in the event of a Ben Simmons trade.
On the financial ramifications of DG re-signing: It won’t be 100% clear until we get all of the details, but my estimation is that the Sixers will sign Green with his early bird rights, and then sign Georges Niang with the tax MLE. This would mean they are not hard-capped.
— Adam Aaronson (@SixersAdam) August 5, 2021
The Sixers simply couldn’t afford to lose Green in free agency. There is no guard option on the team that could step into his role for the time being. Matisse Thybulle has the defensive prowess but not the offensive upside of Green. While Furkan Korkmaz tried admirably to step in for Green during the Hawks series, the difference was noticeable.
Why the Sixers needed to re-sign Danny Green: His 3-point shooting efficiency
For all the Twitter slander that was created by Lakers fans during Green’s bubble struggles, he was still a great 3-point shooter. Green shot 40+ percent from long range for his third consecutive season. Even more impressively, he shot 41.2 percent on 6.3 attempts per game. Prior to 2021, Green had never attempted six 3s per game. His closest was 5.6 attempts in 2014 with San Antonio.
That speaks to two things. Part of it is how the modern game has changed, but there’s a need from a spacing/shooting standpoint just to have Green there as a sniper. Furkan Korkmaz is the only Sixer that comes close to Green’s efficiency at 37.5 percent on on 4.9 attempts per game from 3.
As we saw in the Atlanta series, Korkmaz is better coming off the bench for Green than he is starting in place of him.
There also just weren’t many high level three point shooters on the market. J.J. Redick and Wayne Ellington might’ve been there for the taking, but they’re also both defensive liabilities unlike Green.