It seems like Ben Simmons’ situation is getting out of hand.
The Philadelphia 76ers want to trade him and he wants to be gone, but his steep asking price is driving every single team away.
Simmons’ trade value continues to drop by the day, not because of his skills – or lack thereof – but because of his desire to be traded.
And, according to Celtics insider A. Sherrod Blakely, the Celtics could be a dark horse in the race to win his sweepstakes:
“I could absolutely see it happening if the price keeps dropping. To me, it’s going to be one of those things where Ben Simmons would have to say ‘I want to play with Jaylen Brown and Jayson Tatum.’ Because there’s no way that they’re going to get either one of those guys—Philly that is—in exchange for Ben, it just won’t happen,” said Blakeley, as quoted by Heavy.
The insider also said that if the Celtics feel like they could get him without giving up any of their core pieces, then Brad Stevens will try and make a run at him:
“I look at this as a situation where you know, remember where a few weeks ago all the talk about Dennis Schroder and his future. Celtics were nowhere on the radar, the thinking was that there’s no way in hell that he would wind up in Boston because he’s going to demand too much money and they’re just not going to make the money work,” Blakely added. “And then low and behold they get him for like less than $6 million. If you can somehow finagle a way to get Ben Simmons and it doesn’t cost you in any way shape or form Jayson Tatum, Jaylen Brown, Robert Williams, Al Horford, if you can you can keep that foursome intact and add Ben Simmons, if some type of combination of the other guys, hell yeah you do that.”
Simmons is incredibly talented and quite young and he’d make almost every team better. But he’s not going anywhere unless Daryl Morey is willing to meet someone in the middle.
