After being relatively quiet for most of the regular season thus far, the Philadelphia 76ers‘ president of basketball operations Daryl Morey finally broke his silence regarding the club’s most polarizing player in Ben Simmons. He did so on the 97.5 The Fanatic in an interview with Mike Missanelli.
There was a lot that Morey spoke on, but the main piece of information that most fans and media outlets were excited to hear on was anything regarding Simmons. Morey had several things to to say about Simmons, but the most important is the following quote. TOTH to Kyle Neubeck of PhillyVoice for the quote.
"“I think it’s less likely than likely, but hopefully I’m wrong…Look, it won’t be from lack of trying…And I only say less likely, it won’t be because we don’t want to do it, it will be because for whatever reason, I mean I can tell you that these other 29 teams, none of them wake up and say, hey, today, how can I help the 76ers get better? They’re all worried about their own teams. The main reason I say less likely than likely is it takes two or three to tango.”"
Sixers’ front office is not optimistic about a potential Simmons trade happening this season.
A lot to umpack from that quote. The main thing is Morey is painting the narrative that there’s a real chance that this current roster makeup without Simmons playing is the one that could be entering the postseason this year.
He did mention in the interview that he believes that the Sixers are contenders right now because of the Joel Embiid insane level of play. While I tend to agree that Embiid does give them a small shot to make a deep run, it doesn’t mean you can bet on Embiid giving this roster enough to make an Eastern Conference Finals.
It should be noted Morey did give Simmons praise in the interview as well as noting the Sixers needs to either repair the situation between them and Simmons or trade him. However, at the end of the day, Morey made it clear that fans should prepare for the reality that Simmons is still on the roster post-trade deadline.
In this interview, it’s apparent that Morey is setting the narrative to where if the Sixers can’t get a Simmons trade done during this season, he believes that this team is good enough to have a puncher’s chance in the playoffs.