Way, way back – all the way back on Friday – the Sixers’ reality was so much simpler than it is now. The team looked OK, with the potential to get better at Thursday’s trade deadline. With the potential to offload somebody and get bench help or rebounding help or luxury-tax relief. Or all of the above.
Veteran forward Kelly Oubre Jr. has heard the same speculation everyone else has. He has heard his name bandied about as possible trade bait, since he is a useful player with a manageable contract.
(He is earning $8.4 million this season, the last on his deal.)
Asked after Saturday night’s 124-114 victory over New Orleans whether the chatter bothers him, he said at first that it did not.
Then he paused, and reconsidered.
“It does kind of stink a little bit to have a contract that is easily, like, washable, you would say,” he said. “So I’m putting in the work, showing up every day, showing what I mean to this league and to this team. And hopefully, I can not be in this position again.”
With Paul George’s suspension, things would appear to be different than they were. Now it would appear that Oubre – already part of the Sixers’ most effective lineup – would be a guy they need to keep, Daryl Morey willing.
Now, it seems, the guy with the washable contract is anything but disposable.
Before Saturday’s game, coach Nick Nurse said replacing George will be a group project, that it will take the combined efforts of several guys to replace all that he did, as a scorer, playmaker and defender. Nurse then listed seven players, Oubre foremost among them.
“There are shots there,” the coach said. “Somebody’s got to fill in and take those shots. I imagine Kelly’s kind of played that role for us a lot already. I would imagine some of those shots, or a good portion of those shots, will shift back over to him.”
Gotta be music to the ears of Oubre, who at age 30 is 11 years into his career, and on his fifth team. He comes off as a free spirit, as a guy who is a loud and amusing presence in the locker room. A guy whose many tattoos include one on his leg of Bruce Lee (because, Oubre once said, he is not only a martial arts fan but “a big fan of being like water”).
But his game reflects a certain seriousness, a certain diligence. That’s reflected by another one of his tats, this one on his upper abs. “Sacrifice,” it says, an homage to his dad, who raised him first in New Orleans and then Houston, in the wake of Hurricane Katrina.
He often guards the other team’s best perimeter threat, and offensively he makes adroit cuts and astute decisions – something that has been especially useful recently, as he has melded with the George-Joel Embiid–Tyrese Maxey–VJ Edgecombe lineup. Oubre’s shooting percentages this season (49.5 percent from the floor, 36.9 percent from the arc) are both career highs, and his 14.2 point-per-game average is slightly better than his career norm (13.3).
Nor should his off-court energy be dismissed.
“It’s very vital,” backup center Adem Bona said earlier this season. “Someone like him that has a lot of experience in the game, honestly, brings that kind of energy day in, day out. … He pushes the younger guys to want to match his energy, to do as much as he does for the team.”
On Saturday Oubre scored 19 points, three after collecting Edgecombe’s behind-the-back pass at the top of the circle and burying a third-quarter triple. Afterward Oubre needled Edgecombe about the play, as the rookie met with reporters at his locker.
“He made the shot,” Edgecombe said, stifling a chuckle. “That’s all that matters. I just got it there on the money. It was a little shaky at first. I was a little worried. … But it looks good. The points (are) all that matters.”
Oubre, sitting in the interview room and cradling his infant son TsuSun shortly thereafter, acknowledged that there is “a little bit” of pressure to make a shot after a pass like that, that there is a desire to complete a highlight-worthy play.
“But,” he said, “you can’t think about it in the moment. You’ve gotta just let it fly.”
Either way, he added, “It takes a lot of cojones to make that type of pass, especially with a lot of defenders around. So VJ, he’s goated for that one, man.”
It was left to Embiid to finish things off. He notched 17 of his season-high 40 points in the fourth quarter, nine in a closing 20-7 rush.
“But at the end of the day, man, any given night we have a team that people who can show up and put points on the board, be key contributors to winning,” Oubre said.
They will get the chance to prove that now, with George out and a five-game road trip commencing Monday night against the Clippers. And Oubre can only hope to be “a key contributor to winning,” as he put it.
Everything will come out in the wash, as it always does. But on the face of it Oubre’s contract doesn’t look nearly as washable or expendable or whatever-able as it did, only a few days ago.
