We’ve already heard rumors of teams’ interest in Sixers forward Mareese Speights as the NBA trade deadline this year, most notably the Portland Trailblazers. The Blazers reportedly made an offer for Speights, which the Sixers rejected. The Portland executives aren’t the only ones out there who some value is Speights, in a recent ESPN.com column, John Hollinger named Speights as one of his 11 “under the radar” players teams could target at the trade deadline.
“He’s in his third season and the Sixers still don’t play him much, but he’s another player teams in need of frontcourt help should be pursuing. Like Wright, Speights isn’t much of a defender, although he at least injects humor with his spirited but slapstick-quality flop attempts.
Speights’ gift is the midrange J — he can flat-out fill it up from midrange, helping him average just under a point ever two minutes for his NBA career. There just aren’t a ton of players who can make that claim, especially ones who are 23 and spend most of the game near the end of the bench."
The issue that the Sixers may be facing here is that if they deal Thaddeus Young, they’ll likely need Speights to take at least a portion of those minutes.