By Sean Kennedy (@PhillyFastBreak)
First off, let’s get this out of the way quickly. Aside from his yearly trip(s) as a visitor, Kevin Durant is not coming to Philadelphia. Enough people are keeping this crazy pipe dream alive to the extent that I feel I actually need to address it. There are two main reasons why Durant will not be a Sixer next season:
1) Durant is re-signing in Oklahoma City either on a straight 1-year deal or on a 2-year deal with a player option after the first year. Why? After next season, he’ll have accrued 10 years in the league, meaning he can receive a max contract of 35% of the salary cap, as opposed to 30% of the cap. Waiting one season to sign his next, long-term deal will net him an additional tens of millions of dollars in salary as a result, and that’s without accounting for the fact that the salary cap will jump up again after next year. It doesn’t make sense to start fresh with a new team for only one season, so Durant is staying in Oklahoma City.
2) Now, let’s estimate there’s a 5% chance Durant does pass up what could be as much as an extra $100M and leaves (after all, LaMarcus Aldridge just did something similar by signing with San Antonio), he’s still not choosing Philadelphia. As much as Sixers fans are all excited about Joel Embiid, Dario Saric, and Ben Simmons, even with Durant on board, that team is still not winning a title next year. And Kevin Durant is not giving up a year of his prime to go to a team that isn’t winning a title. He’s only leaving if he feels the situation is more conducive to winning a championship than the Thunder team that had a double-digit lead in Game 7 of the Western Conference Finals. Philadelphia is not that situation.
So stop. He’s not coming to Philadelphia. I felt click-baity even writing a few paragraphs to point that out. There are enough exciting things happening with the Sixers franchise right now that Sixers fans don’t need to entertain these absurd fantasies.
Now, as for what the Sixers might actually do in free agency, we had some encouraging news from Bryan Colangelo’s interview Tuesday morning with WIP:
Colangelo talked about not wanting to overpay middle tier FAs. Instead, interested in signing “placeholder” guys to short-term deals.
— Brandon Lee Gowton (@BrandonGowton) May 31, 2016
Philadelphia is in a bit of a catch-22 with all of its cap space. The Sixers have all the room in the world to sign a few players for big dollar figures. However, they’re not yet at a stage of their life cycle where true difference-makers are going to want to come to Philadelphia. Therefore, the situation could devolve into the team lavishing max or near-max money on players not quite deserving of it, which could hamper them down the road.
Still, the Sixers do need to bring some players in to assist the development of all the young guys on the roster. A nice compromise for this quandary is precisely what Colangelo laid out. If you have to overpay, do it with “placeholder” guys on short-term deals, improve the team, and then you’ll have the cap space again when the elite class of free agents might want to come here. It’s a solid plan.
Sam Hinkie placed the franchise in a great situation to succeed going forward. Many people were naturally upset when he wasn’t afforded the opportunity to see it through. However, thus far, Bryan Colangelo has said the right things and given fans every reason to believe he’ll be a good steward for the organization from here on out. Hopefully, in addition to talking the talk, he can walk the walk.
Add The Sports Daily to your Google News Feed!
