The Feb. 10 trade deadline looms large on the horizon, and right now, it feels like the Sixers are in for a silent affair. The chatter around Ben Simmons continues to heat up, but the focus now — at least from the media’s perspective — is the summer, not the trade deadline, when more lucrative possibilities open up for Daryl Morey and the front office.
If forced to lay down a prediction right now, I would say Ben Simmons is going to remain a Sixer past the trade deadline. He’s never playing for the team again, which is money out the window, but he’s not getting traded. Not when James Harden feels like a very real possibility come the offseason.
The Sixers are not going to trade Ben Simmons, even with some reasonable deals on the table.
Were the Sixers governed by any other GM, a trade probably would have been made already. There have been plenty of intriguing offers floated around the rumors mill, but none have made Daryl Morey bite. That’s because Morey is stubborn, but it’s also because Morey is the league’s foremost believer in star-hunting. The Sixers need a second star to maximize Embiid’s prime playing window, and folks, I’m sorry to say John Collins is not that second star.
The more thought I put into the matter, the more I agree with Morey’s very clear logic. You only have one shot at a Simmons trade, and the same possibilities available now will probably be available to some degree in the offseason. Plus, come summer, there will be more potential for a “top-30” player to hit the market. James Harden is the ultimate target, but Bradley Beal didn’t sign his contract extension, Damian Lillard is on track for another letdown season, and the Celtics could finally decide to break up the Jayson Tatum-Jaylen Brown duo. None of that will happen at the trade deadline, but good golly, it could quite realistically happen in the summer. When it does, very few teams have a better starting point in trade negotiations than Ben Simmons, a three-time All-Star who is signed long term and just 25 years old.
There is no reason for Philadelphia to trade Simmons unless it meaningfully moves the needle and keeps the possibility of Harden/Beal/etc. on the table. Take the rumored offers of John Collins, Bogdan Bogdanovic, and a pick. Unless Atlanta is willing to take back Tobias Harris (they’re not), what good does that do the Sixers short-term. Collins is a talented player, but does he honestly move the needle? The fit is strange, and while good, Collins isn’t good enough to meaningfully improve the Sixers’ chances against the Warriors, Suns, and Nets of the world.
Philadelphia will have a puncher’s chance regardless because Joel Embiid is playing MVP-caliber basketball. The Sixers are only one game out of the 1-seed in the loss column right now. Even so, names like Collins, Gordon Hayward, D’Angelo Russell, what have you — they don’t move the needle far enough beyond puncher’s chance given the current NBA landscape. Then, Philadelphia simply has less firepower in future trade negotiations because, for all the fanbase has lamented him, Ben Simmons is an exceptionally talented two-way player.
The only real exception to have been genuinely tied to Simmons and the Sixers is Tyrese Haliburton, but the Kings have since backed out of trade talks. It doesn’t take too much digging to connect the dots and form a strong assumption: the Sixers wanted Tyrese Haliburton, Harrison Barnes, salary filler and picks for Ben Simmons and Tobias Harris, effectively acquiring Sacramento’s top asset and draft capital while also offloading Harris’ contract. That was never happening. Haliburton looks more like a star with each passing day, to the point where Sacramento might even hesitate on a straight-up swap of contracts. Haliburton is still on his rookie deal and essentially locked in for another seven years. The Kings simply are not doing that trade.
There is a reason the Sixers want a genuine top-30 or top-40 player in return. Because that’s what’s required to really move the chains for this franchise. Just getting something back for Simmons doesn’t change enough in the short-term, and it potentially hamstrings Philadelphia’s flexibility in the long term. The James Harden smoke is very real, and given his ambitions as a GM, one has to believe Morey is letting Harden inform his decision-making ahead of the trade deadline. And rightfully so, especially if the Sixers have been tampering, which teams around the NBA appear to be suspicious of already (you’ll sacrifice a second-round pick and a hearty fine of ownership for James Harden any day).
If you want to eventually acquire Harden from Brooklyn, it starts with Ben Simmons. You have to convince the Nets to play ball, and the quickest way to do so is a player of Simmons’ caliber who fits cleanly with Brooklyn’s core of Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving. The Nets aren’t likely to have the same interest in John Collins, for example, even if Collins is also an exceptional fit. Simmons is flat-out the better player, and while it’s easy for Philadelphia fans to convince themselves otherwise, NBA front offices are likely to have a more objective view of the situation.
But it’s a sign-and-trade! Yes, indeed — but it’s also Brooklyn sending James Harden to its biggest division rival. Brooklyn isn’t going to help Harden to Philly unless the Sixers make it worth their while. There’s a good chance the Nets would prefer to let Harden walk to a lesser contender for nothing than accept pennies on the dollar from Philadelphia in a sign-and-trade, immediately transforming the Sixers into their biggest postseason obstacle in the process.
In short, the Sixers don’t have much of an incentive to trade Ben Simmons unless the return is significant, and right now, there don’t appear to be many significant returns on the table. Morey is smart to hold out for a genuine game-changing star, especially with all the smoke floating around Harden and the Nets. It can be hard to stomach a “wasted” year of Embiid’s prime, but if you flip Simmons for the wrong package, you could end up wasting all of Embiid’s prime. Simmons gives you some real firepower in the offseason trade market, when the real superstars tend to get dealt, and that’s enough reason to hold tight unless a truly unbeatable offer comes across Morey’s desk prior to the Feb. 10 deadline.