Philadelphia 76ers: Brett Brown broke poor Mikal Bridges’ heart

Mikal Bridges is really good at basketball.

The former Villanova Wildcat is in the middle of a breakout third season – where he’s averaging 12.9 points and 4.5 rebounds while making 40.9 percent of his shots from beyond the arc as an every-game starter – and looks more and more like a long-term starter for a Pheonix Suns team that’s been punching well above its weight class all season long.

And, as you most certainly know, he should have been doing all of that as a member of the Philadelphia 76ers, as then-interim GM Brett Brown drafted Bridges 10th overall during his lone spin in charge of the draft only to trade him away roughly an hour later for a pair of draft picks.

You’ve probably heard this story ad nauseam to the point of becoming numb to it from an external perspective, but what fans were never privy to was Bridges’ reaction to being drafted by his hometown team – a team that employed his mother no less – only to be shipped out to the desert without so much as a fist bump from Joel Embiid.

Fortunately for NBA fans in Philly, Arizona, and the world over, we finally have a window to that perspective thanks to Mikal Bridges’ very candid appearance on the Adrian Wojnarowski podcast, which you can check out in full here.

It sounds like Mikal Bridges wants to play for the Philadelphia 76ers as much as the fans did.

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When Mikal Bridges heard his name called on Draft Night 2018, it was surely a dream come true.

After bringing a pair of championships back to the Mainline during his three seasons at Villanova under the watchful eye of suit aficionado Jay Wright, Bridges was ready to prove his worth against the best of the best, and, as it turns out, there was one team in particular that he wanted to play for more than any other: The Philadelphia 76ers.

Bridges was born in Philly, played his high school ball at Great Valley, and barely left the city limits to play for one of the best colleges in the country. Bridges is a Philly Jawn through and through, and the idea of playing professionally a stone’s throw from his childhood home had to be incredibly enticing, almost as enticing as playing alongside two of the best young players in the game in Joel Embiid and Ben Simmons.

Though the team did have a pair of starters in place on the wings in J.J. Redick and Robert Covington – both of whom would eventually be traded to the Minnesota Timberwolves for Jimmy Butler – no team in the NBA can ever have enough 3-and-D wings, especially ones measuring in at 6-foot-7 with a 7-foot-1 wingspan.

And, in an incredible twist of fate, the feeling was mutual.

The Sixers brought Bridges in for a workout, spoke glowingly about his game, and surely assured the then-21-year-old soon-to-be-ex-upper classman that he was a player they were targeting on draft night.

Fan anticipation grew with each passing day to the point where not drafting Bridges would have felt like a personal attack, but fortunately, fresh off the horrible mess that will forever be remembered as the “Coleangio Years,” the Sixers finally gave the people what they wanted. They marched their draft card to the lectern- or however the process technically works – and Adam Silver announced for the world to hear with his usual shrewdish charm that “with the 10th pick in the 2018 NBA Draft, the Philadelphia 76ers select: Mikal Bridges, from Villanova University.”

Needless to say, Bridges – and his mom – were over the moon. Fans cheered, Twitter went crazy, and the young man greeted Adam Silver center stage for a hug and picture donning his brand new blue Sixers hat.

And then… it happened.

You see, the Pheonix Suns were also particularly high on Bridges, and once he went off the board, they immediately called up Brett Brown looking to make a deal. They came in hot, offering the 15th overall pick and a 2021 unprotected first-round pick belonging to the Miami Heat – a pick that was considered incredibly valuable at the time – to procure the do-it-all winger away from the first time GM, and before fans knew it, Bridges was gone, on his way to Pheonix.

Now admittedly, this was a fairly impactful trade for the Sixers. They used the Miami pick to trade for Tobias Harris and traded Smith for Tony Bradley, who was eventually the central piece in acquiring George Hill. Had that pick not been in the Sixers’ portfolio, would Jimmy Butler still call Philly home? And what about Matisse Thybulle? Would the Sixers have drafted him if they already had a similar player in Bridges? Would Brett Brown still be the Sixers’ head coach and Elton Brand the GM?

It’s like Doc Brown tells Marty McFly in Back to the Future; one small change can very tangibly change the future. It’s called “The Butterfly Effect,” which is also a movie starring Ashton Kutcher, though not one of particular note.

While we will never exactly know what would have happened had Bridges not been traded to Pheonix, we do now know how Bridges feels about the ordeal, and needless to say, it isn’t great.

“It was tough,” Bridges told Wojnarowski on his namesake podcast,  “As crazy as it sounds, it was tough to enjoy draft night after that.”

*insert crying Pikachu gif* my heart, my heart.

Brett Brown, wherever you are – probably in a seaside shack in either New Hampshire or mainland Australia – do you see what you’ve done? You took a boy brought up cheesesteaks and ‘wuter ice’ and broke his goshdarn Philly heart. That, my friend, is a cardinal sin in the eyes of the basketball gods and surely is the reason why you aren’t in the NBA while your former wards are thriving.

All jokes aside, hearing Mikal Bridges speak candidly about his experience was an incredibly unique curtain-peeling moment that fans of basketball, sports, or just the human conditions should go out of their way to experience. It frames a professional athlete many only know for his stats, fantasy numbers, and parlay-ability through an incredibly candid lens and highlights the human side of big-time NBA trades. While it won’t replace the idea of the three-headed monster of Bridges, Ben Simmons, and Matisse Thybulle bullying opposing ball handlers on the wings for years to come, it certainly provides a nice bookend to an odd chapter in Philadelphia 76ers history.