With the Feb. 10 trade deadline in the NBA quickly approaching, now is the time to take a look at more trade rumors as well as some mock trades to analyze and discuss how they would work for the Philadelphia 76ers.
The Sixers will obviously be at the front of most trade discussions around the league with everything hinging on what the team decides to do with Ben Simmons.
The star guard obviously wants out and the Sixers need to make a move to try and get the top 25 player they so desire in return. They need to bring in somebody to team up with Joel Embiid and get the job done out on the floor and there are plenty of teams out there that would like to acquire him such as the Sacramento Kings.
The Kings are known to have Simmons on their radar, even though they now have made De’Aaron Fox unavailable, but they have other players on their roster to offer for Simmons that may fit around Embiid.
A mock trade performed by Bleacher Report has the Sixers moving Simmons, Georges Niang, and Paul Reed to Sacramento for Tyrese Haliburton, Buddy Hield, and Harrison Barnes.
B/R on why the Sixers would do this trade:
You can count the number of snipers more dangerous than Hield. He’s made more threes than anyone but Stephen Curry and James Harden since entering the league in 2016-17. Double-teams are a must when covering Joel Embiid, and no available upgrade would punish them more than Hield.
Barnes cannot legally be described without the term “solid,” and he’d be an upgrade over Tobias Harris on defense, freeing the Sixers up to try to move their costly incumbent forward in a separate deal. Barnes is also drilling 41.9 percent of his threes this season and has bumped his career mark up to 38.0 percent. Both figures—season and career—are better than Harris’.
Haliburton doesn’t have superstar upside, but he’s a savvy two-way weapon who can disrupt plays off the ball on defense, drain threes (41.7 percent for his career), keep the rock moving and run a slick pick-and-roll with a big man. Just ask Richaun Holmes how nice it is to get spoon-fed by the 21-year-old combo guard every night.
Haliburton is the real prize here. As mentioned, he does not have superstar written on him, but his ability to shoot the ball would be a nice fit next to Embiid as well as having an absolute sniper in Hield who is shooting 38.3% from deep on 9.2 attempts per game. Barnes is also shooting 41.5% from deep so they are great fits next to Embiid
However, the Sixers continue to say they want that superstar player in exchange for Simmons and not to mention, the money doesn’t work so this trade would be unsuccessful. It will be really interesting to see what Philadelphia decides to do when it comes to the young star over the next couple of weeks.
This post originally appeared on Sixers Wire! Follow us on Facebook!
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