Morey- Sixers Hoped McCain Move Would Open Door For A Deadline Addition
When the Sixers traded Jared McCai, the thought some had in defense of the move was that the Sixers were making space to make another trade. That never happened. The…
When the Sixers traded Jared McCai, the thought some had in defense of the move was that the Sixers were making space to make another trade. That never happened. The trade deadline came and went, and the Sixers' only trades were trading away Jared McCain and trading away Eric Gordon, both to get out from under the Luxury Tax Threshold.
But it turns out the Sixers did want to add talent, they just could not get a deal done.
“Obviously the big move was with Jared (McCain). Because we’re playing well, we were trying to upgrade the team and add to the team now. That was goal number one. Obviously no deal materialized, including using the picks we got from the Jared deal. That’s why we did that move a little early. We were trying to reuse those draft picks to add now... We do feel like this deal sets us up better in the future but we were looking to add now and nothing materialized.”
So instead, the only thing the Sixers accomplished was avoiding the Luxury Tax, adding some 2nd round picks, and adding a 1st rounder that will likely be near the end of the round in this upcoming draft. They spent the 16th overall pick on McCain two drafts ago.
Sixers Will Have A Hard Time Spinning This
The Sixers will have a hard time selling this to their fanbase and to the other players on their team. Joel Embiid publicly begged the team to not duck the tax this season, and to instead try to add instead.
"In the past we've been ducking the tax," Embiid said to the media. "So hopefully we think about improving, because we got a chance... I hope that at least we get a chance to just go out and compete, because we got a good group of guys in this locker room, and the vibes are great."
Instead, they traded away a young piece of that core in McCain. MCain was struggling coming off the injury, and didn't have a real place in the Sixers rotation. But he started to shoot better in the weeks leading up to the deadline.
The Sixers could have used some reinforcements. Their guard depth is questionable, and with Paul George out for 25 games, some help on the wings could have benefited them, too. instead they traded away their 4th-best guard and a player many had high hopes for coming off his impressive rookie season.
The Sixers are currently 29-22, and 2.5 games ahead of the Magic for the 6th seed. The goal is to obviously tread water while George is out, and avoid a potential play in-game. Will losing McCain hurt that goal? Maybe not, he was not a big contributor so far this season.
But Sixers fans will see the move as them giving up a young player just to avoid the tax, and the players can't be happy about the move either.
