Finally, the Sixers in several seasons are expected to be players in free agency.  They obviously won’t be in the hunt for the big players like Kevin Durant or Mike Conley, but I would expect Bryan Colangelo is going to throw some money around at some mid-tier free agents. One of the mid-tier players expected to command a max contract, or very close to it, is small forward Harrison Barnes. Whether or not he’s worth deserving of a deal worth $23.5 million a year is going to be the big talking point wherever he decides to go. Looking at it from a far, it could be a lot worse than maxing out a 24-year-old wing who shoots the ball well and can defend multiple positions.

He would certainly be asked to create more on this Sixers team, and that is something he hasn’t been asked to do in his pro career, but he did show it in college at North Carolina. Barnes has spent a good portion of his career as a small ball four in the Warriors lineup. The Sixers are already loaded in the front court with Ben Simmons, Jerami Grant, and now the arrival of Dario Saric. So once the Sixers are committed to Barnes there would have to be another move to create playing time for some of these guys.

I think asking Harrison to take the bulk of the offense in year one with the Sixers would be out of the question, and I would hope Brett Brown wouldn’t do that to him. Having a guy like Barnes in your starting lineup that has playoff and championship experience goes a long way. He knows the grind and the hard work you have to put in to get there.

Let’s be honest, the Sixers can’t go two or three more seasons of just running young players out on the court and hoping for the best. They need to start adding good young veteran pieces to go with the upcoming young pieces they have already. The Sixers have the money to add a guy like Barnes and they may need to throw more money at a player like him if they want to be contenders in free agency with the big boys. Yes, placing Barnes into a situation with a bunch of young players could be bad for him from the start, and he may struggle at times, but once he knows the offense and played with these young players he will be fine.