One crazy trade every NBA team should make

28. Philadelphia 76ers

It’s hard to really fit a trade into the cognition of the 76ers. We are leaving the Hinkie era, in which people were frozen with liquid nitrogen and shattered into second round picks to be swept into the asset bin. Bryan Colangelo’s era is most characterized by waking up surrounded by assets labeled with Hinkie’s return address and pretending to not know how they got there. It’s hard to know where they’re going when they’re deliberately diverting attention away from where they came from. Velocity needs direction.

There is a single certainty in Philadelphia right now, and it’s that Jimmy G’s has the best cheesesteaks and that Joel Embiid is fun. He’s really a lot of lots of fun. Whatever the 76ers do next needs to maximize that fun.

Nerlens, right now, isn’t fun.

“I need to play more.”

“How about you don’t play at all? That’s what you meant, right?”

That doesn’t make anyone happy. Not fun.

However, I think Nerlens can be fun too. The only problem is that that fun probably needs to take place in a different setting. Like pokemon, sometimes one only evolves when given to someone else.

Lots of teams could use Nerlens. Since we’re in happy fantasy land right now, we get to pick whatever we get in return. Who would provide a strong combo with Joel Embiid? Maybe someone with untapped shooting potential. Maybe someone that Joel knows from before his days in the pro. Maybe someone who needs a change of scenery to bloom.

If Stauskus can come from Sacramento and play reasonably well for the Sixers, Ben McLemore can too. I believe.

Hollis Thompson or something to Sacramento for Ben McLemore