76ers' Interest in Veteran Free Agent Should Depend on the Answer to One Big Question

The Bogdan Bogdanović idea only makes sense if the Philadelphia 76ers are honest about what they want to be.

A FanSided article floated Bogdanović as a possible low-cost target if the Los Angeles Clippers decline his team option. On paper, the appeal is easy to understand. Philadelphia needs bench scoring, shooting, and players who can thrive when the offense stalls. For most of his NBA career, Bogdanović has been exactly that type of player.

He has never been a star, but he has often been a useful offensive connector. At his best, Bogdanović can space the floor, attack defenses, and punish teams that overload toward primary creators. He can run a pick-and-roll in a pinch, work off movement, make quick reads, and score without needing the entire possession built around him. That kind of skill set has value on a team built around Joel Embiid, Tyrese Maxey, and Paul George.

The problem is that Philadelphia would not be signing the best version of Bogdanović. It would be a bet that the version still exists.

His recent production has slipped. Injuries and age have chipped away at his reliability, and at nearly 34, he is not the kind of player a team signs with long-term upside in mind. That is important for a Sixers team that may have to decide whether it is still chasing contention around its veteran core or beginning to lean more seriously into a younger future built around Maxey and VJ Edgecombe.

If the Sixers choose the younger path, Bogdanović should not be a priority. His minutes would take opportunities from players who need reps, and his value would be tied more to what he used to be than what Philadelphia is trying to become. A rebuilding or retooling team should not spend its limited flexibility chasing older bench scoring. 

But if the Sixers still believe they can contend, the conversation changes.

A contender can use Bogdanović. It can use his shooting gravity, his confidence, and his ability to turn broken possessions into decent looks. Philadelphia’s offense has too often become top-heavy, especially when its stars sit or when playoff defenses load up on Embiid or Maxey. A healthy Bogdanović would give Nick Nurse another veteran option who can score at all three levels and keep the second unit from becoming too dependent on constant isolation sets from their star players. 

That is the key distinction. Bogdanović would not be a franchise-changing move. He would be a direction-revealing one.

For a young team, he is probably the wrong bet. For a veteran team trying to squeeze one more serious run out of its expensive core, he is the kind of discounted swing that makes sense.

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Wes Dixon is a contributing writer to 76ersRoundtable. He can be reached at [email protected].