Mailbag: Former Celtics guard a looming trade candidate?

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The 76ers are now officially the worst team in the league. Paul George is hurt again. How long will they get to turn things around before they give up on this season? -- Luke C

All the 76ers can say right now is thank goodness they are in the Eastern Conference. Despite having the worst record in the NBA at 2-12, they are only 3.5 games out of a play-in tournament spot and just 4.5 games out of the No. 5 seed (Miami at 6-7). There’s still plenty of time to make up those differentials in theory but the scary part for Philadelphia so far is that they really haven’t been underperforming on their advanced metrics.

They have the worst offense in the NBA through 14 games and their defense (18th) has been subpar as well. They have not been healthy much but even when their stars have been on the floor, they’ve been inefficient with no one out of Joel Embiid, Paul George or Tyrese Maxey shooting above 40 percent from the field. Throw in some internal drama (team meetings that get leaked quickly is never a good sign) and the recipe is there for all this to fall apart under Nick Nurse.

Meanwhile, former Celtic big man Guerschon Yabusele is the only one doing his job in Philly off the bench, shooting 41 percent from 3-point range in his return to the NBA. The team can’t really do anything from a trade standpoint until December 15th (when most of the roster becomes trade eligible) but any minor moves won’t matter if their stars aren’t healthy. Embiid is playing but looks like a shell of himself at this point. He’s 30 years old so the team can’t exactly afford to throw away a year of his prime but they aren’t going anywhere this season regardless if he looks like this. If they show no meaningful improvement by 2025 in the standings, it might be the smarter play just to get Embiid right for next season rather than putting more miles on his tires for a team that’s going nowhere.

To make matters worse, the 76ers first round pick (top-6 protected) is going to the Thunder this year so they stand to gain nothing from a bad season without a massive tank or some lottery luck.