"I am quite confident we were selling high. Obviously, time will tell."

That was Philadelphia president Daryl Morey's quote after a deadline trade that sent second-year guard Jared McCain to Oklahoma City for the 2026 Houston Rockets first-round pick, as well as three second-round picks. Except it may not take that much time to think this is a big win for Oklahoma City — McCain scored 20 points off the bench to lead the Thunder to a win over the Bulls on Tuesday night, the third 20+ point game he's had for the team.

Since the trade, McCain has looked a lot like the guy we saw for the first 23 games last season, when he was the best rookie in the NBA. In 11 games with Oklahoma City, McCain is averaging 12.5 points per game, shooting 43.1% from beyond the arc, and flashing some playmaking skills. He is fitting right in — even getting Jaylin Williams and Isaiah Hartenstein to be part of his dancing TikTok posts.

All of this has led to a couple of questions: Why did the 76ers trade him in the first place? And why couldn't coach Nick Nurse get more out of him this season in Philadelphia?

The answer to the first question is easy: Money. Trading McCain ($4.2 million this season) got the 76ers below the luxury tax, and then waiving veteran guard Eric Gordon allowed the 76ers to convert the two-way contracts of Dominick Barlow and Jabari Parker to standard deals without entering the tax. This was Morey being good to owner Josh Harris and his crew — it's fair not to want to pay the luxury tax for a 33-28, sixth-seed team that is not a title contender (unless a ridiculous number of things break their way).

The other part of this is that when Morey talked about selling high, his implication was that there was not a lot of runway for McCain on a team with a glut of guards, including All-Star Tyrese Maxey, as well as VJ Edgecombe at the top of the pecking order. Nick Nurse struggled to find rotations he liked with McCain, Maxey, Edgecombe and Quentin Grimes, and to be fair, that's a lot of small guards who are not elite defenders. Also, Maxey and Edgecombe are going to get most of the run and shots, and when Joel Embiid and Paul George are healthy, that's a lot of mouths to feed.

Except, Oklahoma City is a team with a glut of guards and it has found a way to make McCain a valuable part of its rotation. As noted by Kevin O'Connor at Yahoo Sports, McCain is working off a lot more dribble handoffs (more than double early this season in Philadelphia), which is helping him find space.

McCain is simply playing with a lot more freedom and looks good doing it — the kind of play and shot creation the 76ers lacked (outside of Maxey) in Tuesday's blowout loss to the Spurs.
Depth matters in the NBA — just look at the Thunder — and no team can have enough shot creation. While there is some logic to the 76ers trading McCain away, he's making it look like they will regret that deal.