The 76ers are having a truly down season. They have 3 incredibly talented players in Maxey, Embiid and George but all of them have had injury issues with Embiid and George in particular missing a lot of time. Their big 3 has only played 10 games together and they're currently outside the play-in. While the ceiling may be high for this team if everyone gets back healthy, it's unclear if that's possible this season and it may be better to manage the health of all players involved. The Sixers would keep their FRP if it falls in the top 6 and they have the 8th worst record in the league currently. With a stacked 2025 draft class, if they decide to tank, this would take away 2 key role players while getting some young prospects and second round picks. They lose Oubre and Drummond, which is a blow, but free agents have been willing to come to the Sixers at a discount and they get younger prospects to try and develop. Dadiet was a recent FRP of the Knicks and has flashed some great upside and Sims is basically a bargain version of Drummond but younger.
The Bulls are also in tank territory, although this isn't quite as much of a tank trade. Since they may end up trading Vucevic, they may need to round out their center rotation in the future and could decide to take a chance on Mitch. He has a descending contract and is All Defensive team when healthy (I know the when healthy is doing a lot of work) and they're not giving up any long term talent to do so. They do take on some extra money but have the space to do so, and Duarte gets very little playing time and I'm not sure Horton-Tucker was going to stick around past this season. They get a 2nd round pick (not a great one) in 2026 as well, but they're mostly here for money reasons.
The Knicks do this to maximize their chances of contending this year as their bench has been terrible to non-existent this year as a result of both the Bridges and KAT trades. There's been a lot of criticism of Thibs but it also seems like the developmental team hasn't been doing the best job with them looking for new coaches in Westchester and Thibs not trusting any of the Kolek/Dadiet/Hukporti trio with significant minutes. This rounds out their 2nd unit and gives them players who can credibly take over and give the starters some rest. THT and Oubre in particular have shown themselves to be solid defenders and have given opposing players some real problems. Drummond is still a double double machine and would add the rebounding the second unit has been lacking.
The new depth chart for the Knicks would be: PG: Brunson, Payne, Kolek SG: Hart, Deuce, Shamet SF: THT, Ryan PF: Oubre, Achiuwa C: KAT, Drummond, Hukporti
That's a team capable of doing some real damage in the playoffs and even contend for a title. They go from being able to trust maybe 8 players to having 11, maybe even 12 if you count Shamet who's been rounding into form.
Thoughts?