Today is Tuesday, and that means the time has come for a Sixers mailbag. And from the looks of it, most of you want to discuss trade scenarios this week. Let's get to it:
From @adrienxpinto.bsky.social: What profile do you see the team targeting (assuming Joel Embiid stays healthy) until the trade deadline (and we are buyers)? In order of priority: A backup point guard, a shooting wing, a starting power forward or a backup center?
As long as Embiid is healthy and the Sixers are within reasonable position to be in the playoffs or the Play-In Tournament, I expect Sixers President of Basketball Operations Daryl Morey to search for avenues to upgrade this roster. It is difficult to imagine Morey and co. not wanting to take their chances on Embiid, Tyrese Maxey and Paul George, especially because time is not exactly endless for this core.
Generally speaking, I do not believe in narrowing a field of trade targets by position or role ahead of engaging in talks. If the best player available for a reasonable price is a wing, the Sixers should make a move for that wing, but the same would be true if they were a point guard. It is all about cost.
Kyle Lowry looks out of his depth as a nightly rotation piece in the Sixers' backup point guard slot. The Sixers finding a quality backup point guard could bolster their bench a good bit, particularly if said player is clearly capable of being viable in a playoff setting. Of course, Maxey will be pencilled in for a massive minutes total if the Sixers reach the postseason, so the Sixers would have to be smart about what they trade for someone whose role could be extremely limited in the playoffs. If it is the best they can do, even finding a decent upgrade from Lowry may be worth a second-round pick or two — especially if the player the Sixers acquire could stick around for multiple seasons.
But with rookie guard Jared McCain out indefinitely — and the possibility of his meniscus injury ending his first NBA season looming — the Sixers could look to find someone capable of backing up Maxey at point guard and also sharing the floor with the Sixers' All-Star point game. But that is the ideal role for McCain moving forward, so if the Sixers did pursue someone of that archetype, perhaps a veteran on an expiring contract would make the most sense.
A team can never have enough wings, especially with the inconsistencies that have been shown by Kelly Oubre Jr. and Caleb Martin during their Sixers tenures. And in today's NBA, many shooting wings can also be starting power forwards — the Sixers could also easily slide George or Martin up to the four in smaller lineups.
Again, I am far more focused on the quality and fit of a specific player — and what it would cost to acquire them — than which position they are listed at. The Sixers have a roster full of players who can be shifted around the positional spectrum to accommodate all sorts of acquisitions.
I do feel, though, that adding a center into the mix in addition to Embiid, Andre Drummond and Guerschon Yabusele would be a misuse of the team's limited resources. This is not just because Embiid playing in the postseason would mean he is logging considerable minutes himself, but because the team having Drummond and Yabusele covers their bases against most matchups at the five in non-Embiid minutes. Neither player is perfect, but if Sixers head coach Nick Nurse is willing to toggle between them depending on the makeup of the their opponents, he will likely be able to get by.
One way to look at it: the Sixers adding a reliable power forward would inherently bolster their center rotation, as it would give Nurse complete freedom to use Yabusele at the five without worrying about not having enough at the four if Drummond is not an ideal backup center for a particular game.
MORE: Breaking down early Sixers trade targets
From @dhafiz26.bsky.social: Do you get the sense that the team now values McCain as a long-term building block, or is there a chance he can get moved for another piece moving forward?
If McCain's season is indeed over, I believe the 20-year-old did enough in 23 games to establish himself as a building block for the Sixers, who should be envisioning a Maxey-McCain backcourt leading them into the future. I would be absolutely floored if the team made him available in any talks.
Is that to say the Sixers would refuse to trade McCain for Luka Dončić or Shai Gilgeous-Alexander if they could? Of course not. But considering the new rules governing NBA trades, even if the Sixers wanted to sell high and capitalize on McCain's early brilliance, they would be extremely limited in how they could actually do so.
As I will remind everyone in all trade-related stories, the Sixers are not allowed to take back more salary than they send out in any trade this season. If they traded a player making $10,000,000, they would be allowed to take back a player making $10,000,000, but not one making $10,000,001.
McCain's salary as a rookie is $4,020,360, a microscopic number compared to the salaries of the kinds of top-flight players the Sixers would need to aim for if they wanted to trade McCain for a star.
Some are worried about the long-term fit of Maxey and McCain given their lack of size and the possibility that such a pairing could be exploited defensively. These worries are understandable, but Maxey and McCain have such massive offensive potential that they deserve every chance to prove they can be a formidable duo moving forward. They have not had many of those opportunities yet.
Above all else, trading McCain during a season in which the team is playing catch-up to try to upgrade a flawed roster built around multiple injury-prone stars would just be crazy. McCain is here to stay.
MORE: How can the Sixers keep their 2025 first-round pick?
From @mgoldenpine.bsky.social: Are we stuck with the Eric Gordon experience until the trade deadline?
Gordon, who was unavailable during the Sixers' wild and controversial win over the San Antonio Spurs on Monday after undergoing oral surgery, is eligible to be traded at any time. The Sixers could also waive him if they wanted to, but they will not: unlike Yabusele, Lowry and Reggie Jackson, Gordon signed a veteran's minimum deal with a player option for 2025-26. Cutting Gordon now would force the Sixers to incur a dead cap hit of nearly $3.5 million for next season, which would not be disastrous, but is also far from ideal.
The far more likely scenario is Gordon being used as salary filler in a future trade to help the Sixers satisfy the aforementioned trade restrictions imposed by the league's new collective bargaining agreement. His salary over just over $3.3 million this season could help the Sixers get over the top in an effort to match dollars in a deal.
But it is also conceivable that no such deal comes to fruition and the Sixers elect to hang onto Gordon in a situational role. Should multiple pieces go down late in the season, there are probably worse bets to make than one on Gordon having a red-hot three-point shooting stretch. With the team potentially being within shouting distance of the infamous second apron in 2025-26 should a few things break certain ways, a $3.5 million dead cap hit could be more significant than one would think — perhaps the difference in whether someone like Yabusele returns to Philadelphia or departs for another team after the stellar season he has had.
The Sixers are almost certainly not going to rely on Gordon in any sort of consistent fashion from here on out. But is it worth waiving him and taking on that extra money next season, just to sign a replacement from the dwindling free agency pool that currently exists? I believe not.
MORE: Guerschon Yabusele wins Victor Wembanyama matchup down the stretch
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