Philadelphia 76ers: Meeting with Kawhi Leonard is a waste of time

While Kawhi Leonard is easily the best available free agent in this year’s class, the Philadelphia 76ers shouldn’t waste their time giving him a meeting.

The Philadelphia 76ers may be in the most unique spot of any team in the NBA.

With more potential cap space then all but three teams in the league at $58 million, but only four players under contract for the forthcoming season (excluding 2019 draftees Matisse Thybulle and Marial Shayok) there are seemingly boundless potential configurations of the Sixers when the season starts in September depending on how the next two weeks shake out.

Now conventional wisdom would suggest that Philly should go after the best players available in the hopes of building a championship competitor in this new posts Golden State-era, but doing so at the expense of their current corp – who were four bounces away from potentially advancing to the Eastern Conference finals – seems short-sighted and potentially disastrous.

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Case in point: the current rumors about Kawhi Leonard.

While slogging through arguably the most boring NBA draft in recent memory, especially if you’d hoped the 76ers would, you know, actually add players with their five picks, ESPN NBA Insider Adrian Wojnarowski dropped and atomic Woj Bomb on the viewing audience at home (and Brian Windhorst) by declaring that Philadelphia may receive a meeting with Leonard in free agency.

What?

What happened to LA Clippers or nothing?

Though the idea of adding Leonard to this current iteration of the 76ers, even if it is just Kawhi paired Ben Simmons, Joel Embiid and a collection of role-players is incredibly enticing – as it would easily make Philadelphia the best team in the Eastern Conference and the odds on favorites to win the 2020 NBA championship outright – is such a low priority meeting worth the potential cost?

I mean we all remember what happened last summer when Philly had max cap space but banked on a woefully misguided meeting with LeBron James (which he didn’t even attend) only to watch him sign with the Los Angeles Lakers like clockwork.

Sure, there is a built-in connection between Leonard and Brett Brown from their shared time together in San Antonio, but clearly the Pop-connection wasn’t enough to keep Mr. New Balance in San Antonio, so why would it make Philly a favorite over two teams filled to the brim with excellent supporting casts?

Despite how much we’d like to make it so, Philadelphia isn’t a warm-weather, high priority free agent destination, and Philadelphia isn’t coming off of a surprise NBA championship win, so to imagine Leonard making an at-best lateral move a few hours south from his North of the Border home seems all but inconceivable even for the most… passionate fan.

Furthermore, every minute Philly tries to lure Leonard to our fair City of Brotherly Love is another minute the team’s current crop of max-caliber free agents to be can look for greener pastures elsewhere. While snagging Leonard would conceivably make Philly better than retaining both Butler and Harris combined, losing either player as part of an ill-conceived Hail Mary to meet with the two-time finals MVP is not a risk this team needs to be taking right now.

A meeting with Leonard could be the difference between being NBA Finals favorites and just contenders, but it could also be the difference between fielding a starting 5 featuring Rudy Gay, Danny Green, and Malcolm Brogdon as opposed to J.J. Redick, Jimmy Butler, and Tobias Harris.

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Simply put, a Jimmy Butler, Tobias Harris, and J.J. Redick in the hand is worth more than a Kawhi Leonard in the bush.