The Sixers nearly traded Ben Simmons for James Harden last week before the Brooklyn Nets stepped in and offered a king's ransom for the superstar bucket-getter.
The Harden talks loomed large over the first month-plus of Daryl Morey's tenure as the Sixers' President of Basketball Operations, and were a source of constant intrigue as they tried to surround Joel Embiid with the right pieces to compete for a championship.
Apparently, though, Harden isn't the only trade Morey has been working on.
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In an appearance Tuesday on the Rich Eisen Show, Sixers head coach Doc Rivers was discussing his relationship with Morey when he dropped an interesting nugget about Morey's activity level as a trade-seeker:
"Daryl's had several trades so far that I've said, 'No, I don't want to do that,' and he moves on. That's the type of relationship you have to have when you have coach and management, I think it works that way."
Oh, really? Several trades?
It's no surprise that Morey, a prolific dealer in his time with the Rockets, would be regularly bringing up ideas for improving the team to Rivers.
NBA
The Sixers were linked at one point late last year to Wizards star Bradley Beal, and reportedly reached out to the Wizards but were rebuffed by Washington. I would imagine Morey approaches Rivers with ideas before initiating talks, so I don't think that would be a place where Rivers shut the idea down.
So we're left wondering... which trades did Rivers nix? Ones where Simmons was again on the move? Ones where Morey wanted to acquire players that Rivers wasn't crazy about?
It's an intriguing thought exercise, even if we might never know which trades Rivers was referencing.
For now, we'll have to see if the current edition of the Sixers can make a championship push - that is, until Morey can convince Rivers to go along with another one of his ideas. It's only a matter of time.
The 2021 NBA trade deadline is March 25.