🚨76ers REPORT: Sixers TRADING 3rd Pick & Paul George For Kevin Durant Or Lauri Markkanen?

🚨76ers REPORT: Sixers TRADING 3rd Pick & Paul George For Kevin Durant Or Lauri Markkanen?

[Music] Some major trade buzz coming in on today’s 76ers now from ESPN’s Jonathan Gavone, NBA draft expert, who’s reporting that the Sixers could trade Paul George and the number three overall pick in a blockbuster trade package for either Kevin Durant or Lorie Markin. Jonathan Gavone is very tapped in when it comes to the NBA draft. So when he hears some things, I tend to give that some value. Now, before we get in to both Lorie Markin and Kevin Durant and more of what Cavon had to say, we’re on the race to 25,000 subscribers here on the channel between us and the Miami Heat Report. Now, last time we did this, we were about a th000 subs behind. Since then, we’ve had a good week here on the channel. Shout out to all you guys. We’re now only about 700 subs behind, so we’re making up some ground, but we got to keep it pushing. If you’re looking for somewhere to get Sixers news all off season long, live for the NBA draft live for free agency, be sure to hit that sub button. All right, so here is what Gavon had to say about both KD and Lorie Markin. Some teams expect the Sixers to be active in trade conversations with names such as Kevin Durant, Phoenix, and Lorie Markin in Utah as potential targets and packages that could include Paula George and the number three pick. Sixers president of basketball operations Daryl my has made a career of being active and aggressive on the trade front, but historically it is rare to see a top three pick being traded. Now, there’s a lot to break down when talking about potentially moving this number three overall pick and especially for players like Lorie Markin and Kevin Durant and we’ll get into each of them in further detail. But when it comes to trading away Paul George and number three, right, of course, trading away Paul George at this point, you have to consider that a win with the way his contract is structured. He’s under contract until 2027 2028. He’ll be 37 years old, making $56 million. At this point in time, even if you believe Paul George can maybe bounce back heading into next season, that’s just a lot of money to be committing to him at that point. And you know, the Sixers do not want to hold on to that. Now, that being said, when you think about trading him away with that third overall pick, is Kevin Kevin Durant or Lorie Markin enough to in that return to say, “Okay, you know what? will part ways with that third overall pick. Will these guys really change our situation? Will it be enough for us to say we’re willing to part ways with a potential franchise level player depending on what you think of some of these guys at the top of the draft in order to get either KD or Markin? Well, let’s start with Kevin Durant because I do still believe Kevin Durant, even though he’s getting older and he’s aging and these Suns team teams haven’t been very good, is still an elite player. Now, you look at the last four seasons, his time with Brooklyn, and then Phoenix, 26 points, 50, 40, not 90 anymore from the free throw line, but still in that 80s range. Like, man, this guy still gets it done scoring the basketball in every single way. He’s still an elite player in this league. I know a lot of people are lower on Kevin Durant over the past couple of years as he’s been injured here and there, although relatively healthy for the most part, but the Suns haven’t seen any playoff success. the teams have been very very disappointing and a lot of people just don’t like Kevin Durant really in general. But when you look at kind of the way the Suns team has been constructed, right? And when they’ve been good, when they haven’t been good, like Kevin Durant has not been the issue there. The issue has been their team construction. What I’m showing you right now, efficiency differential. This is the difference in points scored per 100 possessions when the player is on the floor versus when the player is off the floor. So Kevin Durant a plus 5.6 differential means when he’s on the floor the Suns are almost six points better per 100 possessions than when he’s off. Devin Booker is only a plus.6. And the real problem here with the Phoenix Suns was Bradley Beal at a minus 7.1. So Kevin Durant was never the issue in Phoenix. when he was healthy, he was playing very, very well despite him getting up there in age. So, you think about what this team would look like, right? It’s pretty straightforward. If you do just swap Paul George and number three for Kevin Durant, you know, him entering the last year of his deal and his age, the Suns might just say, “You know what? Give us that number three pick. We’ll take on Paul George’s contract. We can try to get ahead of ourselves in a little bit of a retool here and a rebuild. Maybe trade Bradley Beal, keep Deon Booker. Then you’d be rocking with Maxi Grimes, UB, KD, and Joel Embiid. On paper, I mean, just looking at those five faces there, that looks pretty scary if I’m the opposing teams. Now, of course, Kevin Durant is entering his age 37 season, right? I there’s still a lot of drawbacks and, you know, other things I talk about with Kevin Durant. One being his age and his injury history, but the biggest one, I think, is that he’s entering the final year of his contract, right? 202526, he’ll make just under $55 million. and after that he’s a free agent. So there’s really no guarantee that if you trade for Kevin Durant, even if he plays well, that he’ll return to the 76ers next season. So the question you have to ask yourself and the question Darren Moyer will have to ask him and this 76ers front office is potentially one season of Kevin Durant worth giving up pick number three. Now, I know you also get off the Paul George contract, so you have to consider that as a plus as well. But that’s a huge risk to take, saying, “We’re going to go all in on this one season, put all our chips in in this bag, and hope that getting Kevin Durant, we can stay healthy and win this championship, and then convince him to return in the future seasons when he’ll continue to age as he’ll already be 37 next season.” Now to a player who’s a little bit younger and the conversation conversation is a little bit different with Lori Markinid. Now Lori Markin ever since he he arrived in Utah has been a stud, a revelation. He’s been an all-star ever since leaving Chicago, then one year in Cleveland. You can see his first two years in Utah were absolutely tremendous. Now this past season with the Jazz after he got that mega extension last off season, definitely his worst year in Utah of the three by far. Not to say he was a terrible player by any means. I’m still very high on Lori market and I think he’s a very good player, but he did get paid quite a significant bag and he just didn’t play all that well when he was healthy. And once again, he wasn’t super healthy. Now, the Utah Jazz, you know, they kind of just hold him out a lot of times, especially at the end of the year as they enter their tank situation. But still something to be a little bit concerned about. As I mentioned, he did get paid last offseason and that’s why he was not eligible to be traded during the year. But once we get into the offseason, it is he is eligible to be moved by Utah. And you can see it’s it’s a big contract that Utah gave him and you know, deservedly so. Lori had been very good for them for a couple years in a row at that point. Takes him up through 2028, 2029 when he’ll be 31 years old in the last year of the deal. Look, I know the numbers look huge, but it’s just the way the NBA is right now. If you’re a very good player, you’re going to get paid whatever the max is, you can get paid. There’s really not a whole lot of in between at that point. So that’s kind of the going right for an allstar level player. But man, when I think about Lori Mark and him, I do like him a lot as a player and I think he could be helpful to winning basketball. We haven’t really seen that since he’s been in Utah, of course, because they’ve been so bad. But I’m not just giving up Paula Georgia number three for Lori Markin. I’m sorry. May maybe last year when he was coming off two great years, but based off the decline he showed this year and he does have his limitations as a player despite being an all-star, there’s no way I’m just doing Paul George and three for Lori Markin. So, I think maybe you could make another deal to entice Utah involving some more picks like the one I cooked up here, which is the Sixers receiving Lori Markin. And they also get pick 21 from the Jazz. The Jazz have, I think, four, maybe three first round picks. So you get number 21 from them, you give them three and Paul George still. So they keep number five. So Utah still has pick number five. You give them pick number three. That’s two prime picks in the top five of this draft that they can use to kind of accelerate this rebuild that they’re on. And then to sweeten the pot a little bit, throw in two future second round picks. One in 2027 from either Golden State or Phoenix and then one in 2028 from the Detroit Pistons. Now, I love Lori Markin’s fit in Philly. I love the way his skill set complements all these other players with Embiid and with Tyrese Maxi. I I mean, we’ve talked about Lori Markin in a trade for him for a while now here on the show. It seems like for multiple multiple years at this point, but the question you have to ask yourselves is like, is that worth giving up a potential franchise level guy? The lineup does look good, man. There’s no doubt about it. The lineup does look good with Maxi Grimes, UB, Lori sliding right in there at the four where he can score from all three levels. He can handle the ball. He can spot up. He can catch and shoot. He’s not a great passer, not a great defender either, but not awful in those regards. And he has some of that four, five, four, five flexibility as well. I think could even play the three a little bit. So, before we continue here on the show, I just want to see where your head’s at right now. Now, if you had to pick either Kevin Durant or Lori Markin to trade for, there’s no doubt in my mind Kevin Durant’s a better player, but factoring in contract situation and age and injury history, if you had to pick one, who would you rather trade for? Give me a KD for Kevin Durant or an LM for Lori Marketing. Now, really what this all comes down to for Daryl my on the phones making these deals and he has to decide on potentially pulling the trigger on a trade with Paul George and pick number three. First, you have to look at the prospects that are available. Assuming Flag and Dylan Harper are gone, how much does Mory value those options at number three overall? Then if you don’t really value those guys after the top two, do you believe that Kevin Durant or Lorie Markin make you a championship contender? In my opinion, I don’t think so. And look, obviously Kevin Durant, as I mentioned, is a leap. I really like Lori Markin as a player, but you’re still so dependent on Joel Embiid being healthy and then still filling out the rest of this roster. I’ve said this really all off season, unless I’m getting Giannis in a potential trade, I am keeping the number three overall pick. I think this team should be prioritizing keeping their long-term window and their long-term future open. And I think they do that by using the pick on a young player who can potentially develop into a franchise guy. If you’re the Sixers, you don’t plan to be picking this high for the foreseeable future. I mean, since you got your pick this year, your pick next year is only top four protected, right? And then you still owe future first after that to the Brooklyn Nets. So, there’s probably not going to be a situation where you’re picking number three overall in the draft. Again, you need to use this opportunity to either trade for Aianis, which I don’t see happening, or landing a franchise player. So, I’m passing on these potential Paula George and number three for Kevin Durant or Lorie Mark in trades. Even though you do get off Paul George, I get it. It’s very valuable to get off that deal, but not valuable enough to possibly punt on your future. Now, coming up next, some important draft intel from Gavone, who dived into some more of what the Sixers plans might be at number three, which gives us gives us some insight into where Mory’s head might be at when it does come to a potential trade. But before we get there, big alert on this Fanatics item. This 76ers polo is on clearance. It’s over 50% off. I’ve talked about it on the show before. I’ve shown you guys this product before. It went down to 60 at one point, then it went down to the 50s. Now it’s down to $42, but it’s unclear and so it’s not going to last forever. There are all sizes available at this time. So if you go to chatsports.com76 Polo, you can get this item for over 50% off. You can wear it absolutely anywhere you want. Again, that’s chatports.com/76p polo. Go get the polo before it is too late. All right, here’s the other intel that Gavon dove into on the Sixers draft in his recent mock draft. The Sixers are unsurprisingly signaling that they are looking at a wide group of prospects consisting of Ace Bailey, VJ Edgecom, Trey Johnson, Kaman Malawatch, and Khan Canupal. Ace Bailey, widely considered this draft’s third most talented prospect, is a natural fit here as he could seamlessly slide into the Sixers lineup at the two, the three, or the four, operating alongside any of their current players. So, just a quick recap, according to Cavone, it’s these five guys that the Sixers are considering. Obviously, if Flag or Dylan Harper fell, I think they would take them. So, got Ace Bailey. You know my thoughts on Ace Bailey. I think if they stick at three, he should be the pick. But VJ Edgecom is a very popular prospect as well among Sixers fans and I wouldn’t be mad if they took him at number four. I just think Ace Bailey has a higher ceiling and when you’re drafting at number three, you got to shoot for the stars. Trey Johnson, Kamal Mawatch, Khan Canupal, I don’t think any of them would realistically be the pick at number three. Look, we know Daryl Moy is not going to show his hand. They’re going to keep their options open to the public. And as far as what we know and what a lot of insiders know, they’re not going to tip their hand because they want to keep the value of this pick high. They don’t want anybody to know what they going to what they’re going to do because if other teams know what they’re going to do, then it becomes harder for the Sixers to possibly trade the pick. If teams know that they don’t like the options at number three, which Gavon talked about a little bit as well, specifically on Ace Bailey, the feedback coming out of Chicago suggests Bailey is somewhat polarizing and internal front office conversations because of questions about his feel for the game and unpolished team interviews, which one NBA general manager compared to Anthony Edwards during the pre-draft process. Now, of course, Anthony Edwards ended up going number one overall regardless. Bailey hasn’t come off as a buttoned up as some of his lottery peers, but drew strong marks from a handful of executives who appreciated his cander and willingness to display his big personality. And this is where I could kind of see Daryl my Nick Nurse not falling in love with Ace Bailey. Especially for Daryl my huge analytical guy. We know that Ace Bailey’s analytics are not good. He’s more of a, you know, take a look at his game, look what he does on tape, and you can see the potential. But a lot of the stats, a lot of the analytics do not like Ace Bailey. So if Moy doesn’t like Ace Bailey’s analytics and they don’t like him personally as a prospect, the type of person that he is off and on the floor, there’s a world where they don’t like their options at number three. Now, I will say I don’t think it’s inherently a bad thing that Ace Bailey kind of has these, I guess you can call him character concerns, I think he’s just really confident in his abilities, similar to how Anthony Edwards was coming out, right? He’s going to tell you that he’s good and he’s not going to regret it, right? He’s not going to feel bad about it. So, I don’t think that’s necessarily a bad thing right now for Ace Bailey to be that way. Now, will some teams take that in in the wrong light? Sure, it’s a possibility. Now, my nurse have said they like pick number three. They’ve been on record. They’ve said to the media that we like the options available at number three. We like the different guys that we could potentially pick at this third spot. But again, I think at some point this can kind of just be them talking it up so that if somebody does want to come up and trade for the pick, they can then increase the value of the pick instead of being like, “Ah, yeah, you know what, man? These options at three, they kind of suck. Someone come take this pick off of us, right?” They would never ever do that. So, I do think trading the pick remains a very high possibility. Although, again, I would keep it. But predict it for me. This is not what you would do. This is what you think the 76ers will do come draft night. Will Daryl my Sixers keep or trade pick number three overall? Give me a K for keep. Give me a T for trade down in the comments section. Before we hop on out of here, if you want to give me a follow over on X at Jake uh sorry, just Jake Chipper. No underscore there. No underscore. Just Jake Chipper. Always tweeting, talking about the Sixers. Whenever we post a new video, I post it on there as well as a lot of short form content as well that goes up over on my social media. I would love to get to, you know, know some of you guys more and just talk ball talk sixers as this offseason gets underway. So, give me a follow. Be sure to subscribe. [Music]

Philadelphia 76ers trade rumors on Kevin Durant and Lauri Markkanen headline today’s Philadelphia 76ers YouTube video. ESPN NBA Draft expert Jonathan Givony reported in his recent 2025 NBA Mock Draft that Daryl Morey and the Sixers are expected to be active in trade conversation, particularly with Kevin Durant and Lauri Markkanen as 76ers trade targets while trading away Paul George and the 3rd overall pick in the 2025 NBA Draft. 76ers Now host Jake Chipper reacts to the latest Sixers trade rumors on today’s 76ers Now!

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Jonathan Givony on 76ers trade rumors:
“Some teams expect the Sixers to be active in trade conversations, with names such as Kevin Durant (Phoenix) and Lauri Markkanen (Utah) as potential targets in packages that could include Paul George and the No. 3 pick. Sixers president of basketball operations Daryl Morey has made a career of being active and aggressive on the trade front, but historically, it’s rare to see a top-three pick being traded.”

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Kevin Durant stats:
– 2024-25 Stats (62 GP): 26.6 PPG, 6.0 RPG, 52.7 FG%, 43.0 3P%
– 2023-24 Stats (75 GP): 27.1 PPG, 6.6 RPG, 52.3 FG%, 41.3 3P%
– 2022-23 Stats (47 GP) – BKN/PHX: 29.1 PPG, 6.7 RPG, 56.0 FG%, 40.4 3P%
– 2021-22 Stats (55 GP) – BKN: 29.9 PPG, 7.4 RPG, 51.8 FG%, 38.3 3P%

Lauri Markkanen stats:
– 2024-25 Stats (47 GP): 19.0 PPG, 5.9 RPG, 42.3 FG%, 34.6 3P%
– 2023-24 Stats (55 GP): 23.2 PPG, 8.2 RPG, 48.0 FG%, 39.9 3P%
– 2022-23 Stats (66 GP): 25.6 PPG, 8.6 RPG, 49.9 FG%, 39.2 3P%
– 2021-22 Stats (61 GP) – CLE: 14.8 PPG, 5.7 RPG, 44.5 FG%, 35.8 3P%

76ers Lauri Markkanen trade idea:
76ers Receive:
– Lauri Markkanen (F)
– 21st OVR Pick
Jazz Receive:
– Paul George (F)
– 3rd OVR Pick
– 2027 2nd-Round Pick (via GSW/PHX)
– 2028 2nd-Round Pick (via DET)

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Jonathan Givony on Sixers draft rumors:
“The 76ers are unsurprisingly signaling they are looking at a wide group of prospects, consisting of Bailey, VJ Edgecombe, Tre Johnson, Khaman Maluach, and Kon Knueppel. Bailey — widely considered this draft’s third-most-talented prospect is the natural fit here, as he could seamlessly slide into the Sixers’ lineup at shooting guard, small forward or power forward, operating alongside any of their current players.”

Philadelphia 76ers Draft Targets:
– Ace Bailey (F, Rutgers)
– VJ Edgecombe (G, Baylor)
– Tre Johnson (G, Texas)
– Khaman Maluach (C, Duke)
– Kon Knueppel (G/F, Duke)

NEXT FOR YOU – More Philadelphia 76ers YouTube videos:
– 🚨REPORT: Philadelphia 76ers TRADING #3 Overall Pick In 2025 NBA Draft? Sixers Rumors & News – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2toN2h2nACU
– 76ers Draft Rumors: Sixers Interested In THIS Player After NBA Combine Meeting? – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iJHKmRkXnII
– 76ers Draft News: Ace Bailey Is The CLEAR Choice For The Sixers At #3 Overall In The 2025 NBA Draft – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GZ1l4_KMcpk

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Jonathan Givony on Ace Bailey:
“The feedback coming out of Chicago suggests Bailey is somewhat polarizing in internal front-office conversations because of questions about his feel for the game and “unpolished” team interviews which one NBA general manager compared to Anthony Edwards’ during the predraft process. Bailey hasn’t come off as “buttoned up” as some of his lottery peers but drew strong marks from a handful of executives who appreciated his candor and willingness to display his big personality.”

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– Pick one to trade for: Type ‘KD’ for Kevin Durant or ‘LM’ for Lauri Markkanen
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