The Philadelphia 76ers continued their eventful offseason, having successfully re-signed forward KJ Martin to a new two-year deal to bring the regular roster to just three openings left. While it’s not out of the ordinary for the franchise to re-up the young wing, what definitely shook some were the terms of his new deal.
Despite playing as a third-stringer for the most part, Martin managed to come out with a two-year, $16 million deal — hardly a justifiable figure for a player not expected to play much anyway. Daryl Morey isn’t a reckless spender, though, and accounting for context in the market, this could be a signal that he is brewing something big.
Daryl Morey is setting the 76ers up for something big after re-signing KJ Martin
At this rate, Philadelphia can only afford to hand out minimum deals with their financial leg room basically sapped by their litany of signings. Also, thanks to the new CBA, with the 76ers pushing beyond the first apron, they can no longer take back more salary than they send out in potential trades.
Re-signing KJ Martin to an above-market rate deal, however, is a savvy way to open up other possible avenues to still improve the roster. The 76ers can probably tap into players in the $8 to $10 million range with the possibility of shooting for a higher ballpark if they manage to aggregate him with their other players, though that could be counterproductive given their sensible additions.
Letting Martin stay is honestly not a thrilling prospect. He’s overpaid and doesn’t really have a skill set that would be easy to integrate as a consistent part of the rotation with his lack of acuity outside the paint and mediocre connective passing.
Thus, it’s most likley that the front office will exhaust all means to trade him for a safer option that can crack the rotation, even if that means attaching other pot sweeteners or including other players as part of the deal.