Philadelphia 76ers: Thaddeus Young has picked up his Indiana option

After some heavy speculation, ex-Philadelphia 76ers big man Thaddeus Young has exercised his $13 million option to remain an Indiana Pacer.

With the internet buzzing about which players will end up where when free agency opens up on Sunday, one player who will be staying put his former Philadelphia 76ers forward Thaddeus Young.

That’s right, after some pretty heavy speculation, the 30-year-old power forward has decided to pick up his player option to remain a member of the Indiana Pacers for the 2018-2019 NBA season, earning a very solid $13.7 million in the process.

Though he likely wouldn’t have been a target of the Sixers for a second go-around with the team, Young was a fixture of the team from 2007-2014 when he was selected overall 12th overall in the 2007 NBA Draft.

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A crafty 6-foot-8, 221 pound forward with the ability to play both power forward and small ball center, Young quietly cemented himself as a Philly fan favorite over his half-decade in the City of Brotherly Love before ultimately being traded by then-rookie GM Sam Hinkie in the three-way Andrew Wiggins trade as he helped to initiate The Process.

From there, Young bounced around the league before ultimately finding a home in Indiana, where he’s been a fixture of the team starting lineup over the last two seasons.

Averaging a solid 11.4 points and six rebounds per game over the last two seasons, Young has been a great fit in the Pacers loose scheme, a far cry from Brett Brown‘s current pass-heavy, movement based offense.

Boy how things have changed since Young left town.

While it seems incredibly unlikely that we will ever see Young, Jrue Holiday, or Andre Iguodala in Sixers red white and blue again, especially after the latter two signed extensions with their current club last offseason, it’s worth wondering how that team would have fared in the modern NBA had they not been blown up to initiate The Process.

The perennial playoff losers, the pre-Brown Sixers likely would have continued to be good, but not great, consistently finding themselves ‘just a few players away’ from being contenders after making it to the playoffs in four out of five seasons before Hinkie came to town.

For better or for worse, you can’t say that about the current Philadelphia 76ers.

Next: Report: Philly is no superstar free agent’s first choice

With two of the best under-25 players in the league currently on the roster, and enough cap space to conceivably add a top-15 talent this summer, it looks like the Philadelphia 76ers made the right decision moving on from Thad, Iggie, and Jrue, even though we had to sit through four years of really bad basketball to make it happen. Trust The Process.