August 27, 2024
Bill Streicher/USA TODAY Sports
Daryl Morey and James Harden -- once tied together -- saw their relationship take a turn for the worse last offseason.
All of the good vibes were gone after the Sixers suffered an embarrassing Game 7 defeat at the hands of the Boston Celtics to wrap up their 2022-23 season. Joel Embiid's fitness to lead a championship-winning team was called into question, it was unclear if Sixers President of Basketball Operations Daryl Morey would be able to retain James Harden and nobody knew who the head coach of the team would be moving forward.
The last issue is the one that was resolved first, when Morey and Sixers brass made the decision to fire Doc Rivers, who enjoyed tremendous regular season success during his three years in Philadelphia but never broke through. Rivers' replacement: Nick Nurse, who had been exiled from the Toronto Raptors four years after leading the organization to its only NBA title.
Plenty more fireworks were still to come, and most of them were not exactly the kind that excited Sixers fans. But what felt like a torturous summer in the moment turned out to set the stage for a new era of Sixers basketball a year later.
In the final edition of our Sixers offseason rewind series, let's recount the events of the 2023 offseason and how they paved the way for the present day's new-look Sixers:
The Sixers did not own a single draft pick in 2023 -- they traded their first-rounder, which landed at No. 28, to Brooklyn as part of the package that netted them Harden. Their second-round pick, meanwhile, was revoked by the NBA after an investigation into whether or not the team committed tampering violations with free agents P.J. Tucker and Danuel House Jr. in the prior offseason.
But, before the night was over, the Sixers did manage to add a young prospect who, a year later, would be coveted by 29 other NBA teams.
Ricky Council IV, a dynamic athlete on the wing out of Arkansas, was considered one of the most appealing members of his draft class to not be selected. The Sixers quickly swooped in and signed Council to a two-way contract, enabling him to enter training camp with the team and likely spend most of the season in the G League.
By the time the regular season was over, though, Council had asserted himself as a player with a very real chance of becoming a quality rotation piece for a long time. He earned a four-year standard NBA contract at the end of the season, and finished his rookie campaign with 32 appearances. The Sixers' rash of injuries during the season was damaging in many ways, but without many key absences, the Sixers would not have known that Council is capable of impacting winning to the extent that he was at times during the latter portion of the year.
Council genuinely swung a few games in the Sixers' favor with his tenacious and relentless play style on both ends of the floor. The Sixers do not expect him to ever become a lights-out three-point shooter, but between the NBA and the G League he shot 38.9 percent from beyond the arc on over 130 attempts. If he can even be in the ballpark of that percentage moving forward, Council's long-term outlook will only become more exciting.
Entering his first full season on a standard NBA deal, Council is expected to be competing for an opening night rotation spot, where his minutes would likely come as a small-ball power forward. Council's blend of explosiveness, strength, physically and length make him viable in that spot and others.
Right before free agency officially began, the Sixers were still awaiting Harden's decision on a $35.6 million player option. If Harden was going to seriously consider departing Philadelphia, many expected him to decline that option and sign with his former team, the Houston Rockets, as a free agent.
As rumors escalated that the Rockets were no longer interested in reuniting with Harden -- instead turning their attention to veteran point guard Fred VanVleet -- it became entirely unclear what Harden would do or where he would be playing in 2023-24. Ultimately, he made a decision that stunned many: he opted into his player option and requested a trade (the word "demanded: might be more fitting). Harden went on the offensive, with the Los Angeles Clippers being his desired destination. The summer after taking a $15 million pay cut to allow his long-time partner in Morey to assemble a championship-caliber roster, Harden went on the record calling Morey a "liar," saying he would never play for an organization Morey is part of again.
Just as he did when Ben Simmons pulled a similar stunt two years prior, Morey refused to give into the temptation to make an immediate trade and rid the organization of more public embarrassment. Morey rebuffed trade offers for Harden that he believed were not up to par and insisted he would be willing to wait as long as necessary to receive the best return possible... or convince Harden to return. The song and dance would take place during the entire summer and head into the regular season, clouding Nurse's training camp and preseason with the Sixers.
Morey's goal in any Harden trade became clear: use him to either receive a full-fledged star player in return, or trade him for the requisite tools that can be turned into one later on. That meant not taking on long-term contracts of good-but-not-great players; prioritizing financial flexibility and draft picks over short-term rotation upgrades.
With a $35.6 million commitment already having been made to a player desperate to get out of Philadelphia, Morey had the difficult task of filling out the remainder of the team's roster in free agency. In the face of extremely difficult circumstances, Morey did an admirable job.
Young center Paul Reed, who emerged as a quality backup to Embiid the year prior, was a restricted free agent, and the Utah Jazz inked him to an unusual three-year, $23.5 million offer sheet. The deal included a clause that if Reed's team did not advance to the second round of the 2023-24 NBA Playoffs, his salaries in the following two seasons would be non-guaranteed. The Sixers matched the deal and brought Reed back into the fold.
Reed did not have the year he wanted in 2023-24 -- particularly because his playoff performance was subpar -- but matching the deal was a no-brainer for the Sixers. There was no opportunity cost in the short-term; the Sixers were already well over the salary cap. The Sixers hoped Reed would prove to be their long-term answer at backup center and be well worth the money he received.
But because the Sixers did not advance to the second round, the final two years of Reed's deal became non-guaranteed until January of each season. The team viewed him as a positive asset on his deal, even after his poor showing against the New York Knicks in the first round, but he turned into the victim of a number's game. Veteran center Andre Drummond being available to return to Philadelphia for less money than Reed made and free agent wing Caleb Martin's market plummeting into the range of Reed's deal made it a no-brainer to shed his contract and just sign Drummond and Martin. The Sixers waived Reed, and he was claimed by the Detroit Pistons -- meaning he will remain on the unconventional deal in Motor City for the time being.
In the interest of preserving long-term flexibility, the Sixers declined to bring back their own free agents seeking multi-year deals. They watched a critical contributor in Georges Niang depart for the Cleveland Cavaliers on a three-year, $25.5 million deal. Seeking a larger, more consistent role, Shake Milton left for a two-year, $10 million pact with the Minnesota Timberwolves with only one guaranteed season. Trade deadline acquisition Jalen McDaniels agreed to a two-year deal worth $9.2 million with Toronto. In retrospect, all three of those contracts aged poorly for the teams who signed them.
So, it was on to the veteran's minimum market for Morey and the Sixers. Their first addition there was tenacious veteran point guard Patrick Beverley. Beverley had a brutal start to the season, but came on strong during the winter, giving the team a major lift on both ends of the floor as a key component of its second unit. At the trade deadline -- after 47 appearances for the Sixers -- Beverley was traded, shocking many people. However, the team was able to flip him to the Milwaukee Bucks for Cam Payne -- who proved to be much more useful for the Sixers the rest of the way -- and a future second-round pick.
To fill the third-string center spot, the team signed former No. 6 overall pick Mo Bamba, a friend and long-time training partner of Embiid. Bamba did not give the Sixers terrible minutes, and that alone makes for an acceptable minimum player, but it would have been nice if their third-string center had been viable in a playoff setting. Bamba was an innings-eater in the regular season, playing 57 games and starting 17 when Embiid was injured.
The team also signed Danny Green, bringing back a veteran who enjoyed his previous stay in Philadelphia on a prove-it deal with a minuscule guarantee. Green was actually part of the team's opening night rotation, but was soon waived to create the necessary roster space for a trade. Green logged 18 minutes across two appearances for the Sixers at the beginning of the 2023-24 season and has not appeared in an NBA game since.
Finally, the Sixers made a gamble that no other team was willing to make: coming off a season in which he averaged more than 20 points per game for a lowly Charlotte Hornets team on poor efficiency, Kelly Oubre Jr. could make the necessary changes to his game to impact winning.
Their bet paid off in a major way, as Oubre became a staple of Nurse's rotation and a fan favorite. Not only was he capable of contributing to winning, but he was capable of doing it in several fashions: over the course of the season, he changed roles constantly to give Nurse whatever he needed on a particular night. Oubre had stretches where he thrived as a spot-up shooter, some as a cutter, some as a traditional scorer and some as a defensive ace. The Sixers made it a priority to bring Oubre back this summer, and were able to do so, with him widely expected to start on a full-time basis in 2024-25 after starting in 52 of his 68 appearances in the first year of his Sixers tenure.
The most important decision the Sixers made last summer was something they did not do, though. Tyrese Maxey, clearly on his way to stardom, was eligible to sign a contract extension. The Sixers quickly decided that they would not ink him to a deal for the sake of preserving as much cap space as possible in the following summer, where they had their sights set on adding another star player. The decision ended up saving the Sixers well over $20 million in space by the time this summer began, and every penny of that proved to be essential.
The Sixers' hopes of competing at the highest levels always rest on Embiid's health, and in 2023-24 things took a turn for the worse. Embiid only played 39 regular season games and had to hobble through multiple ailments during the postseason. While not bad, the team's 47-35 record was not exactly cause for celebration -- nor was their first-round playoff exit.
But the results of the 2023 offseason should not be judged by how the team performed in 2023-24, they should be judged by what the Sixers were able to pull off the following summer.
Just a few games into the regular season, Morey finally pulled the trigger on a Harden deal, sending the 10-time All-Star, P.J. Tucker and Filip Petrusev to the Clippers. The Sixers received three veteran role players -- Nic Batum, Robert Covington and Marcus Morris Sr. -- along with youngster KJ Martin, two future first-round picks and a future first-round pick swap.
The deal allowed the Sixers to create an enormous amount of salary cap room in the upcoming offseason, especially with Tobias Harris' albatross contract finally coming off their books (the Sixers shedding the final year of Tucker's ill-advised deal also proved to be a major victory). All of that cap space turned into Paul George -- who came to Philadelphia on a four-year max deal to partner with Embiid and Maxey -- as well as Caleb Martin and the returning Drummond, all while the Sixers were able to bring Oubre back and maintain all of the draft picks they acquired when they dealt Harden.
In the moment, the 2023 offseason was one of the most discouraging and upsetting summers in recent Sixers history. In retrospect, though, everything the Sixers did was geared toward making the next summer as exciting as possible -- and the 2024 offseason certainly lived up to the hype.
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