Trey Burke should be in high demand as an injury replacement
Ex-Sixers guard Trey Burke should be a top injury replacement option.
The Philadelphia 76ers never really gave Trey Burke a chance.
An afterthought signing weeks removed from the addition of his former Jazz teammate Raul Neto, Burke was inactive for eight of the Sixers’ first 10 games, and didn’t crack the 20-minute mark until November 23rd against Miami; a mark he would only reach three times in 2019-20.
Sure, Philly did allow his contract to become fully guaranteed in early January, a move some fans assumed spelled good news for his future, but those dreams were quickly dashed when Burke was waived unceremoniously along with Jonah Bolden to make room for trade deadline acquisitions Alec Burks and Glenn Robinson III.
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While there have been the occasion rumblings of other teams potentially being interested in Burke as a free agent addition, he remained unsigned on the final day of the ‘traditional’ regular season, all the way through the present day.
But, in a weird twist of fate, Burke has all of a sudden become one of the most in-demand players in the NBA depending on how things shake out with the league’s new return to play strategy.
Allow me to elaborate.
According to Shams Charania, when the league returns, teams will be allowed to keep 15 players (plus their two-way players) and dress 12 on game days. That’s pretty much normal. What isn’t normal, however, is that if a player is unable to come to the NBA bubble in Orlando – whether for medical or personal reasons – their team will be awarded an injury exemption, which will allow another player to come in and fill their shoes.
Sure, some (most) teams may use this spot on one of their two-way players (Marial Shayok), and there will all but certainly be some politicking by players on expiring contracts stuck on non-competing teams who want to secure a buyout to play for a contender (Vince Carter?), but players like Burke who could conceivably come, workout for, and sign with any team they like will get heavy consideration.
And really, what team in the NBA doesn’t need a second unit guard who can create his own shot?
Despite his lack of positional versatility and incredibly underwhelming defensive prowess, Burke was actually a very efficient scorer over his abbreviated 25 game 2019-20 season – knocking down 48.3 percent of his 3.6 shots from 2, 42.1 percent of his 1.5 shots from 3 for 5.9 points per game. Could those averages go down with more attempts? Most certainly, both percentages are higher than his career averages, but at the same time, you can’t knock Burke for leaving it all on the court when his number was called.
If a team like the Rockets, the Lakers, or even the Suns want to juice up their second unit with a score-first pick-‘n-pop scorer, Burke has to be near the top of the team’s list.
Next. Ben Simmons should focus on jacking up 3s, not weights. dark
Do you know who else could use a player like Trey Burke? The Sixers. Could the dynamic trio of Josh Richardson, Shake Milton, and Alec Burks ultimately combine to pick up the primary ball-handling slack when Ben Simmons is off the court for 12ish minutes a game during the playoffs? Maybe so, but with only one true reserve point guard, Raul Neto, under contract going into the final stretch of the 2019-20 season, I’d rather have Burke sitting on the bench than scoring buckets for the other team.