The Philadelphia 76ers are now on the verge of elimination after the Knicks spanked them in Game 3. Now, their eyes should be set in the coming offseason, where the front office will have to make a slew of hard decisions with half of the players on their current roster set to hit the open market. Case in point? Look no further than Quentin Grimes, who will be a major talking point for the team's brain trust this summer.
In deciding what to do with Grimes, the 76ers can be guided by the not-so-distant past. Last year, his camp adopted a hellbent position in demanding a lucrative pay raise from the franchise. Obviously, that did not work out for them, and Grimes had to settle for the team's qualifying offer. Well, nearly a calendar year from that, suffice to say that the front office made the absolute right call.
Grimes, who came over from Dallas at the deadline last year, had a coming out party in Philly once he temporarily took over as the primary scoring option on the team due to the revolving door of injuries they had to face in the prior campaign. But despite his late-season brilliance back then, the 76ers probably saw something bigger, yet more grounded in that there is simply no reprising that degree of production in the context of a more modulated role –– and boy were they correct.
The 76ers did the right thing not yielding to Quentin Grimes during last year's free agency
This season, Grimes was handed a prominent role as the team's nominal sixth man. He averaged nearly 30 minutes a night, doubling as their go-to fill-in option to start games when one of their core players were out. Unfortunately, he was not able to truly make the most of his extended minutes all year long. He struggled with his shot for the most part, and his deficiencies were only magnified when the playoffs kicked off.
Grimes shot just 33.4 percent from three-point range during the regular season, which is a red flag in and of itself for someone profiled as a go-to floor spacer. His shot was so inconsistent that it seemingly affected his assertiveness. In these playoffs, he has averaged just 6.8 points a night despite logging nearly 23 minutes per contest.
All in all, the 76ers seem to have dodged a major bullet there. Grimes was never going to be worth the $20-$25 million contract he was reportedly rallying for. If anything, the team put on a great display of restraint by recognizing that they were basically bidding against themselves and that it would be more prudent to wait for another year before getting into the real reckoning.
Now, the front office has been vindicated, and Grimes will most certainly not be offered anything close to what he initially wanted.