3 reasons why the Sixers shouldn’t trade Ben Simmons to Lakers

The Los Angeles Lakers made trade headlines recently when it emerged as a possible suitor for Philadelphia 76ers star Ben Simmons.

Los Angeles, currently 16-13, hasn’t had a positive start to the season due to injuries to LeBron James and Anthony Davis, and key rotational players that are slated to play big minutes in Trevor Ariza and Kendrick Nunn haven’t yet played this year.

The Lakers’ biggest move over the summer involved acquiring Russell Westbrook from the Washington Wizards via trade. Los Angeles already had limited finances to work with entering the summer, but adding Westbrook’s $44 million salary to the books tightened that number further.

But as the trade rumors now begin to swirl, LeBron Wire spoke with Ky Carlin of Sixers Wire to get Philadelphia’s perspective on the Lakers’ interest in Simmons.

Carlin listed three reasons why the Lakers don’t make sense as a trade partner for the Sixers:

The Lakers don’t have anything to offer the Sixers

Ky: “The Lakers would assumably want Simmons to join their Big 3 of LeBron James, Russell Westbrook, and Anthony Davis. Therefore, they would offer the Sixers a slew of their role players in order to try and get
a deal done. The Sixers have made it clear that they do not want role players in exchange for their 25-year old All-Star. Of course, a third team could get involved in order for the Sixers to get that top player, but that makes things complicated and Los Angeles should be focusing on other areas anyway to help their team.”

The finances don’t work

Ky: “The Lakers will have to send out roughly $25.4 million in salary to Philadelphia in order to make a Simmons trade work. That would require Los Angeles having to do one of two things: Either trade one of their Big 3 or they move Talen Horton-Tucker, Kendrick Nunn, and up to seven other players to make it work. It just isn’t feasible. It’s surprising to see them have interest, in the first place.”

It makes little basketball sense

Ky: “The Lakers need to put shooting around their three stars and Simmons is most certainly not a shooter. In order for the Lakers to succeed on the offensive end, they have to be able to find room for James, Westbrook, and Davis to all have success on the offensive end and to do that, they need more shooting. They don’t need to bring in another playmaker who won’t even shoot the ball outside of the paint.”

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