It’s probably not a debate that when you consider the best and worst possible outcomes for every team in the lottery on Monday night, the Sixers have the most at stake collectively out of any team participating.
If Philadelphia wins the first pick, there’s a good argument to be made the Sixers can turn things around quickly and contend next season while also being set up decently well for life after Joel Embiid. If the Sixers send their first-round pick to Oklahoma City, the path towards a quick fix gets a lot more complicated. We decided to tier the outcomes for Philadelphia on Monday night and offer our thoughts on what might happen with the first-rounder below.
Tier One: First overall pick
This is the Cooper Flagg lottery. There are some drafts where there is no “can’t-miss” prospect or others in which good arguments can be made for a few different prospects. This is one where practically all the drama involving the first-overall pick will come down to which team gets to make it and not what prospect said team selects.
Given the injury-plagued seasons we just endured for Embiid and Paul George especially, it is a no-brainer for the Sixers to select Flagg if they win the lottery. In a perfect world, Embiid and George are healthier in 2025-26 and Flagg slots right in as the team’s starting power forward. With Tyrese Maxey and Jared McCain back, and Quentin Grimes likely back, Philadelphia would be looking pretty formidable with these six players at the top of the rotation. Perhaps more importantly, Flagg would allow a less bleak transition out of the Embiid era should Embiid’s health fail to improve. Building the next generation of Sixers basketball around Flagg, Maxey and McCain seems like a good place to start.
Decision: Draft Cooper Flagg
Tier Two: Second overall pick
It seems like Dylan Harper is the pretty clear second overall pick in this year’s draft. The Rutgers product is a very dynamic offensive player whose shot creation and finishing ability seem to have separated him from the pack amongst the non-Flagg prospects. Like Flagg, Harper seems like a good fit with the Sixers too given that the majority of Philadelphia’s guards are on the small side and Harper is 6-foot-6, which would give the Sixers some better size in the backcourt.
While Flagg is the clear prize of this year’s lottery, I don’t think there’s much debate as to what the team with the second overall selection will do. There are scenarios that can be discussed that involve the Sixers retaining the pick on Monday night and then using it in the trade to kickstart their offseason in an effort to return to contention as fast as possible. Those scenarios begin at 3.
Decision: Draft Dylan Harper
Tier Three: Third, fourth and fifth overall picks
The third overall pick is where we begin to see some variance amongst the mock drafters. CBS Sports had Tre Johnson going third overall this past week. Our editor Paul Hudrick has been in Johnson’s camp and Johnson appears to have elite offensive upside. Baylor’s V.J. Edgecombe is billed as a polished two-way prospect whose athleticism could create some lockdown perimeter defense with George on the opposite wing. Ace Bailey of Rutgers is the third and final player I’m putting in this tier. Bailey does not come across as a finished product offensively, but looks like a freak athlete who could contribute immediately on defense and on the glass.
Johnson seems to be the riser here as Bailey and Edgecombe were mocked in the top four all season long. Bailey is listed at 6-foot-10 and therefore could play power forward in the NBA. At 6-foot-5, Johnson has an inch on Edgecombe which may make him a little more appealing for the Sixers given the aforementioned lack of height amongst Philly’s guards.
It’s reasonable to field offers on a pick as early as the third overall selection if you’re the Sixers. If you’re looking for a comparable scenario, the Lakers had a bad season in 2018-19, the first in which LeBron James was on the roster, and got some lottery luck to land the fourth overall selection in 2019. They were in win-now mode, as any team with James on its roster is, and that pick became a part of the Anthony Davis trade with New Orleans. Of course, we have to see who is available, but if the Sixers are truly confident in Embiid and George bouncing back, landing the third overall pick would be the highest you would even consider this kind of a trade for a star.
In his public comments since the season ended, Daryl Morey seems committed to Embiid and George and therefore the idea of a pick this high being used to get off of a perceived “bad contract” does not seem very practical. The wise move here seems to be to stick and pick. A prospect that’s drafted in the top five is still going to be someone who can come in and contribute right away and is going to be much younger than any player that comes up in trade rumors between the lottery and the draft. Considering the uncertainty around Embiid and George’s health, Morey and his staff should draft the player they believe has the highest long-term upside here amongst the three assumed candidates.
Decision: Draft Tre Johnson, V.J. Edgecombe or Ace Bailey
Tier Four: Sixth overall pick
It looks like this is the beginning of a new tier in mock drafts and so naturally it starts at the latest possible slot the Sixers can draft in this year’s first round. ESPN recently did write-ups for every lottery team and highlighted the prospect the team should select if it stays in its pre-lottery position. Jonathan Givony assumed the top four picks would be Flagg, Harper, Bailey and Edgecombe and had the Sixers selecting Oklahoma’s Jeremiah Fears over Tre Johnson. Givony noted the slight height advantage for Johnson as something that might bode well for his chances to be selected by Philadelphia but seemed to think Fears’ late-season surge in the SEC and NCAA Tournaments would give him a slight nod.
A 6-foot-4 guard who wasn’t a consensus top-six pick until recently, and still isn’t in some mock drafts, is probably not going to excite anyone and also wouldn’t go a long way in helping the Sixers compete in 2025-26 which seems to be Morey’s top priority. As a result, I’d make a stronger argument for Kon Knueppel here. Knueppel is three inches taller than Fears and is a marksman from the three-point line having just shot close to 41% in his lone season at Duke. We already know Maxey, Grimes and McCain can knock down outside shots and if the team drafted Knueppel, it’s probably safe to assume they’d have at least two of those four players on the floor at all times. From a floor-spacing standpoint, having this much shooting on the roster seems awesome.
However, if the Sixers land this pick, I would probably select Khaman Maluach. I wrote more extensively about Maluach and the Sixers last month before the Final Four. It’s obviously pretty high to draft a backup center which is what Maluach would be to start. But backup center has long been an issue for the Sixers and Maluach would be an elite one at that and could be eased in slowly behind Embiid. Ideally, by the time Embiid’s career was over, Maluach developed enough of an offensive game to be a high-end starting center.
Having said all of that, I do not think this is the decision Morey will make. Knowing he must get the team back into contention next season or he could be fired, I think Morey selects a player he knows will play a lot right away or looks at trades involving the pick and so I think a trade is firmly in play if Philly lands the sixth pick, a pick slot they have a 19.6% chance of landing.
Decision: Draft Khaman Maluach or Kon Knueppel
Tier five: Forfeit the pick to Oklahoma City
Are you a glass-half-full or glass-half-empty kind of fan? The glass-half-full fan looks at the team’s 64% chance of the pick landing between one and six on Monday night and will enter the lottery feeling pretty good about keeping the pick. That fan will even be excited about the possibility of landing Flagg. The glass-half-empty fan will point to the fact that the single-highest percentage of any slot when it comes to odds for where the Sixers’ pick lands, is seventh overall at 26.7% which of course will send the pick to the Thunder.
Josh Grieb wrote about what the Sixers should prioritize for the rest of the offseason if they do not have a top-six pick in this year’s draft. Forfeiting the pick to the Thunder would certainly get the offseason started on the wrong foot and more importantly force the Sixers to miss out on a top prospect in what looks like a pretty good draft. But, let’s continue to travel down the worst of paths here since we’re now discussing the worst outcome for Monday night.
Let’s say there is no major bounce back in the health of either Embiid or George and the offseason additions are mostly misses yet again from Morey. Sure, 2025-26 might not be 24-58 again, but it could certainly end without a playoff berth, or even a spot in the play-in tournament. At that point, the Sixers would go into next year’s lottery with no conditions on their own 2026 first-round draft pick. Granted, they would still owe a top-eight protected first-rounder to Brooklyn in 2027 or 2028. But, keep in mind the Sixers still hold a 2028 unprotected first-round pick via the Clippers which looks like a valuable asset. If that pick is not traded in this upcoming offseason, a bad 2025-26 would ensure that Philadelphia would want to hold on to that pick.
The point here is if the next 12 months for the Sixers are anything like the last 12 months, it will be time to usher in a new era of Sixers basketball. It might still be difficult to move off of Embiid and George’s contracts at this time next year, but there will not be the same “bounce back” discourse many fans seem to be having now. While the outstanding first-round debt to Brooklyn still being on the table would slightly complicate a rebuild, a lottery pick in 2026 and the Clippers’ unprotected first in 2028 would be a good place to start. One would figure if Morey and Nick Nurse were let go that a new regime would probably come in and focus on sending more players out and adding more draft picks too at that point.
But all of that is a discussion that’s better tabled for this time next year if things really do look that bleak. What’s far more certain is that a top-six pick in this year’s draft will likely help the Sixers for next season and for years to come. So yeah, if the pick gets sent to the Thunder, it could be the start of another rough offseason that might be the precursor to a larger rebuild. While the asset cupboard isn’t bare, it’s by no means a good place to be in.
Decision: Start drinking
