Jahlil Okafor has a new home, and he couldn’t be happier about it.
As reported by ESPN.com’s Zach Lowe, the Philadelphia 76ers agreed to send the 22-year-old big man, who was drafted third overall in 2015, along with Nik Stauskas to the Brooklyn Nets in exchange for Trevor Booker:
The Sixers are nearing a deal to send Jahlil Okafor to Brooklyn, league sources tell ESPN.
— Zach Lowe (@ZachLowe_NBA) December 7, 2017
Philly will send Okafor, Nik Stauskas, and a second-round pick to Brooklyn for Trevor Booker, sources say.
— Zach Lowe (@ZachLowe_NBA) December 7, 2017
The trade itself is considered a win for both sides. The Sixers are jettisoning two players they weren’t using now and weren’t going to re-sign this summer for a scrappy veteran, in Booker, who will work hard off the bench and help them in their push for a playoff berth without adding to their financial commitments beyond this year. The Nets, meanwhile, pick up two more first-round prospects to evaluate against their rebuild.
Okafor, for his part, is ecstatic about the deal, according to The Vertical’s Chris Mannix:
Jahlil Okafor is "extremely" happy about the Brooklyn deal, source told @YahooSports. Opportunity to get minutes, develop in Nets program big.
— Chris Mannix (@SIChrisMannix) December 7, 2017
No kidding.
Okafor has played just 25 minutes across two appearances this season. He hasn’t factored into the Sixers’ future for some time, and the team decided to make it official by declining his fourth-year player option and removing any hope that he’d see minutes in the rotation. He’s been waiting to get traded for over year, and doubly over the past few weeks, when he became more open about his desire to be somewhere that wanted him.
The Nets may not exactly want him—not badly anyway. But they have the room to play him. Neither Tyler Zeller nor Timofey Mozgov really factors into their rotation, and their most reliable big is being shipped to Philly as part of this trade. Jarrett Allen will get plenty of spin, perhaps even starting, but Brooklyn has the roster makeup and timeline flexibility to really see what Okafor has in his arsenal.
Don’t be surprised to see him chucking threes or trying to get up the floor as a rim-runner in transition. The Nets will give him opportunities to work in the post; they did the same last season with Brook Lopez. But they also like to push the ball, a style which runs counter to Okafor’s skill set. Knowing he didn’t really cost them anything other than an expiring contract and veteran voice, though, the stylistic divergence doesn’t matter. The potential rewards far outweigh the nonexistent risks.
