After the NBA free agency dust has settled, teams start to explore trade possibilities. The Philadelphia 76ers is one team that is not done tweaking their lineup.
After former GM Sam Hinkie initiated "The Process," the new GM Bryan Colangelo has to make sense of the harvest that Hinkie reaped.
That includes three centers (from the top three recruiting colleges in the nation): Nerlens Noel, Joel Embiid and Jahlil Okafor. Noel missed his rookie season and played in the 2014 season. Okafor joined him a season later and Embiid has missed all of two seasons already. But his long-awaited debut is coming, along with first overall pick Ben Simmons and their draft-and-stash prospect Dario Saric.
That's six players standing at or above 6'10"-who are also probably their best players and this is why Colangelo was forced to admit that someone has to be shipped (h/t Real GM).
"There's no question you can look at our roster and say we have some unbalance," said Bryan Colangelo. "We're top heavy. We have some good talent there."
He continued: "We have to figure out what we're going to do with everybody. When you look at the calls coming in, quite frankly, everyone's trying to poach a big man from us."
While Colangelo would like to think that he is on the receiving end of offers, Jonathan Tjarks of The Ringer believes that the Sixers "would be trading from a position of weakness" because the league knows they can't be competitive with this lineup.
The Sixers wanted a high return for Okafor-somewhere along the lines of the 3rd overall pick in this year's draft which they were supposed to use for Kris Dunn. That would have been a viable plan to give them two rookies with playmaking capabilities.
However, the Celtics didn't cave and held out the pick for a superstar deal-which they also failed to close. Now, the Sixers have to get creative if they want to deal the former Duke Blue Devil.
Tjarks proposed that trading Okafor to the Minnesota Timberwolves where he could form a tandem with Rookie of the Year Karl-Anthony Towns. He illustrates how that could work.
"Karl-Anthony Towns might be the ultimate unicorn in the NBA," Tjarks claimed. "Towns's ability to pass and shoot from 20-plus feet would make Okafor nearly unguardable around the rim. Whether it's Zach LaVine or Kris Dunn straight up, or some combination of Tyus Jones, Shabazz Muhammad, Gorgui Dieng, and Adreian Payne, it would not be hard for the Wolves to come up with a trade package."
After Kris Dunn's showing in Summer League, the T-Wolves may balk at trading him, or make the choice between him and LaVine extremely difficult. Shabazz Muhammad has potential to be a scorer and Jones is a very smart back-up-that could be one of the best they can do.
Tom Thibodeau is a coach who can make most rosters work. He was able to bring the Chicago Bulls to the playoffs even when the roster was badly decimated. He was even able to bring out the best in Carlos Boozer-another low post scoring Duke product.