Trendon Watford Looks Like A Godsend For The Cap-Strapped Sixers

With Joel Embiid, Tyrese Maxey and Paul George all signed to max contracts, the Philadelphia 76ers won’t have much financial flexibility for the next few seasons. They’re going to be well above the salary cap as long as those three are on the roster, which means they’ll be fairly limited in free agency every offseason.

This past summer was a clear example of that. Unlike the 2024 offseason, when they splurged on George, Caleb Martin and Andre Drmmond before re-signing Maxey and Kelly Oubre Jr., the Sixers barely spent anything this year. They signed Trendon Watford to a two-year, $5.3 million contract and signed Dominick Barlow, Jabari Walker and Hunter Sallis to two-way deals. That was it in terms of external free-agent additions.

If Saturday’s game against the Toronto Raptors was any indication, that alone might have been a major help to the cap-strapped Sixers.

Watford, who missed the first three games of the year with a hamstring injury, made his first start of the season against the Raptors. He finished with a season-high 20 points, a career-high 17 rebounds and a career-high 10 assists for his first career triple-double in the Sixers’ 130-120 win.

Watford flirted with a triple-double against the Brooklyn Nets earlier in the week, too. He finished with 16 points, nine rebounds and seven assists in 25 minutes before fouling out. He got the job done Saturday, though, providing a huge lift to a Sixers team that was without George and Jared McCain and still has Embiid on a mid-20s minutes limit.

If Watford’s play in recent games proves to be sustainable, it will be a godsend for a Sixers team that needs to find steady contributors on the cheap to surround their Big Three.

Watford Living Up To Nick Nurse’s Vision

At media day, Sixers president Daryl Morey revealed that head coach Nick Nurse has long had his eye on Watford as a potential fit in his system.

“He’s a guy that can run the floor, sprint to the corner and finish a layup,” Nurse said. “Or he can grab the rebound, bring it himself, get you into the offense. Great vision. Sees the floor. Draws defenders. Finds the right plays. And then he can score a bucket, too, if we need him to. We like it. I’m glad he’s here.”

Nurse wasn’t the only members of the Sixers clamoring to add Watford. Maxey has been friends with him since high school, and their on-court chemistry was on full display against Toronto.

“I mean it when I say we call each other every day, literally, every single day. That’s for the past, I don’t know, since senior year of high school,” Maxey told reporters after the game. “… When you have the friendship and the bond off the court, it carries over to on the court. When you’re on the court and a screen is coming, your brother don’t want you to get hit, so he’s gonna make sure he has your back.”

Watford’s ball-handling ability is fairly atypical for a 6’9″ forward. Since he’s so comfortable with the ball in his hands, he’s able to explode to the basket off the catch, and he’s not afraid to drive into contact and draw fouls. That’s a stark difference from a certain other jumbo playmaker whom the Sixers used to have in recent years.

“T-Wat can bring it as well, but he’s also a good post-feeder,” Nurse said after the game. “We can play some stuff through him. As you guys saw, we punched it in to Joel for the first time in many moons. And that was good, and a lot of that was because Wat can find those angles and make those passes in there.

“Again, he’s got a lot to his game. Let’s not go too crazy, but he can do a lot. He can post, he can drive, he can pass. And evidently, he can rebound. Tyrese said he couldn’t rebound, but he did today.”

Later in the third quarter against Toronto, Watford showed more of his two-man chemistry with Maxey. As soon as Maxey passed him the ball at the top of the three-point arc, he started flying toward Watford, who bounced a between-the-legs pass to him as he sprinted by. Watford proceeded to knock Maxey’s defender clean off his feet with a bone-crunching screen, freeing up Maxey for a wide-open three-pointer.

Once George makes his season debut, he figures to supplant Watford as the Sixers’ starting 4. But given the on-court chemistry that Watford has with Maxey, the Sixers need to continue finding opportunities to pair the two of them together.

Watford And VJ Edgecombe Might Bail The Sixers Out

At the end of last season, the Sixers’ long-term outlook appeared fairly hopeless. They owed more than $100 million annually to George and Embiid, who combined to play 60 relatively ineffective games last year.

Landing the No. 3 overall pick in the 2025 NBA draft was a shot in the arm for the Sixers. They used that pick to select Baylor guard VJ Edgecombe, who is already neck-and-neck with Dallas Mavericks forward Cooper Flagg in the Rookie of the Year race. Having Edgecombe locked into a cost-controlled rookie-scale contract through 2028-29 will ease some of the pain from Embiid and George’s massive contracts.

The addition of Edgecombe has helped Maxey reach a new level, too. The rookie has been surprisingly adept on the ball, which has freed Maxey up to operate off the ball far more frequently than he did last season, when defenses routinely hounded him in the absence of George and/or Embiid. In crunch time Saturday night, the Sixers had Edgecombe initiate the offense rather than Maxey, which prevented the Raptors from loading up on either Maxey or Embiid defensively.

Watford could be a revelation in that regard, too. His ball-handling and passing ability should further free up Maxey for additional off-ball reps, which could make him that much more effective. It also makes the Sixers far less predictable, as they now boast multiple players who can run the offense on any given play.

The best part is, Watford isn’t necessarily only a one-season rental. The Sixers have a $2.8 million team option on him for the 2026-27 season which they’d be a virtual lock to pick up if he maintains his early-season level of play. Spending roughly $14.5 million combined on Edgecombe and Watford in 2026-27 would be one way to help blunt the pain of spending more than $110 million on Embiid and George.

The Sixers will still have some difficult decisions to make next offseason, as Oubre, Drummond and Quentin Grimes are all set to become unrestricted free agents. They’ll have to decide how much they’re willing to spend on each and which (if any) of the aprons they’re OK with crossing.

Either way, the Sixers could enter the offseason with a core of Maxey, Edgecombe, Embiid, George, Watford, Jared McCain and Adem Bona all locked in for the 2026-27. That’s not such a bad starting place heading into free agency.

Unless otherwise noted, all stats via NBA.com, PBPStats, Cleaning the Glass or Basketball Reference. All salary information via Spotrac and salary-cap information via RealGM. All odds via FanDuel Sportsbook.

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