Trying to Make Sense of the Sixers' Offseason Moves

Nick Young's a ball hog and proud of it.

Prior to the start of last season, the Philadelphia 76ers had a definite direction. With Elton Brand and Andre Iguodala present on the roster, the team would try to develop its young players, and hopefully advance out of the first round in the playoffs. The end result of the 2011-2012 season was regarded as satisfactory: a Game 7 loss in the Eastern Conference semis, an improvement to a five-game first-round exit the year before.

The 2012 offseason was, or is, supposed to be the next step in the team becoming a contender. Except, with the Atlantic division strengthening around them, the Sixers really haven't improved their roster much at all.

The Brooklyn Nets have completely revamped their team and possibly become contenders in the blink of an eye; that is for another column. The Raptors added Kyle Lowry to pair alongside DeMar DeRozan and Andrea Bargnani. The Celtics grabbed some big names, Jared Sullinger and Fab Melo, in the draft, but both are NBA question marks. 

So what have the Sixers done?

The draft is where the head-scratching began. With the 15th pick, they selected Moe Harkless out of St. John's, who is a player with potential, but one who simply does not fit on this current roster. The best-case scenario is that he becomes a right-handed version of Thaddeus Young, a player the Sixers have under contract for the next four years. Philly was already overloaded at the small forward position; in addition to Young, Evan Turner and Andre Iguodala, who is still on the roster, also play the position.

What would have made more sense would have been to take a big man with the pick; that is the glaring weakness. The Harkless signing seems to be in hope of trading Iguodala for Pau Gasol or another established big. But with the current roster, Harkless' addition will create a minutes disparity and/or guys playing out of position too often.

The Sixers did eventually take a big man in Arnett Moultrie, with the 27th pick. The problem here, though, is they gave away next year's first rounder to the Miami Heat in order to draft him. Why not just take him at fifteen, or trade down if they knew he'd still be there?

What has transpired after the draft has not been very encouraging either. Thus far the front office has:

Re-signed Lavoy Allen for 2 yrs, $6 million
Re-signed Spencer Hawes for 2 yrs, $13 million
Amnestied Elton Brand, owing him $18 million
Chose not to re-sign Lou Williams, Jodie Meeks, Tony Battie, Sam Young, and Xavier Silas
Signed Nick Young for 1 yr, $6 million

There is one positive. Lavoy Allen's contract is very reasonable; last year he showed his excellent defensive post presence, and he has potential to develop his offensive game. He's a valuable bench player at this stage, but he will have an opportunity to prove himself this season and may see starter's minutes.

And then Spencer Hawes is back. There probably weren't many alternatives, but from a diehard fan's perspective, he is just difficult to watch. Kevin Garnett ran all over him in the playoffs; as a result he lost minutes to Allen. He plays rather soft and is nonathletic. Capable of scoring spurts at times, he earned $13 million, I guess, from two twenty-point performances in the postseason. Hawes is a capable backup, but going into 2012-13 with him in position to start makes fans uncomfortable.

More puzzling than the Harkless and Hawes signings was the decision to amnesty Elton Brand. If you are not familiar, the amnesty clause, new in last year's collective bargaining agreement, allows teams to waive one player's contract from their salary cap figure while still paying the player in actuality. Brand was a hardworking player who gave 110% in every game he played with the Sixers, but his production had not merited his contract. The fact he was amnestied is not especially controversial, but ESPN's John Hollinger explains the problem with the move, as the timing was off:

But let's get back to Philly, who both amnestied Brand and announced they'd be parting ways with Lou Williams on Friday, and then said they reached a one-year deal with Nick Young.

What, exactly, are they going for here? Even after the amnesty, Philly has just $7 million in cap room, which is perhaps enough to put in a bid for the likes of Ersan Ilyasova or Kris Humphries, but if you're going to do that you might as well ride out another year with Brand, right?

Even more puzzling is the timing. If Philly had determined to amnesty Brand a week ago and not bothered with Young or the recent two-year, $13-million deal with Spencer Hawes, the Sixers were looking at max cap space and the chance to lure a top free agent. Not a great chance, perhaps, but a chance.

Now? They're looking at, best-case scenario, signing somebody almost as good as Brand. One wonders if another move is waiting around the corner -- an Andre Iguodala trade, perhaps, or some other move that will allow us to make sense of all this.

There really is no direction to what the front office is doing right now. Meeks, Battie, Sam Young, and Silas can go. Meeks had his moments, Battie is a great veteran presence to the younger guys and will probably be a coach someday, and Young worked harder than anyone, but no one in Philly is going to outcry over these moves. But why Nick Young? He is a ballhog. Plain and simple. In a team that is trying to build around Jrue Holiday and Evan Turner, two guys that already don't like to pass much, adding Nick Young won't make the big guys in the game happy.

To try to justify the move: the Sixers needed a pure scorer, and Young gives them that at a much lower price than Lou Williams would have been. The problem with Young is, well, everything except his scoring. And he doesn't score efficiently either: he shot just 40% last season. But he may be able to help the team avoid those six-minute scoring droughts that plagued them in the postseason.

I will do a follow-up post to this later in the offseason when more moves have been made.