What next for Yabusele and the Sixers?

Things are going well, or at least much better than they were a few weeks ago in Philadelphia. After a shaky start to the season, the Sixers have righted their course. They still don’t seem like a real power alternative in an East where the Celtics are a safe bet (and a very powerful one) and where the Cavaliers and Knicks are pushing hard. But, hovering just above the play-in places in 11th (13-18), at least they have managed to gain some stability, avoid premature collapse, and put themselves in a position to put together a block and forge a truly competitive style for the playoffs. Let’s see what happens... Given the way things started, that’s not a bad outlook.

Joel Embiid has slowly been getting into the swing of things and has begun to show signs of the dominant player he usually is, certainly in the regular season. Tyrese Maxey is establishing himself as a sure bet (and on the rise) and, although Paul George has not particularly shone in his role as the third leg of the new big three, some of the supporting players are sending good news to a team with a lot of payroll burdens due to the contracts of the three stars.

First there was rookie Jared McCain, who unfortunately suffered a serious knee injury when he was on his way to the Rookie of the Year award and will not play again this season. Others who are responding are Kelly Oubre and Guerschon Yabusele, the latter increasingly comfortable in the rotation and not as forced to do too many things as he was at the start of the season.

The demands were very high for him, in a team plagued by absences and in the midst of a crisis, and with the need to put out too many fires while he settled into the NBA’s rhythm upon his return to competition five years later.

A strategic find for the Sixers

Yabusele took advantage of his excellent performance (key in the silver medal) with France at the Paris Games to sell himself in the NBA, which he had left through the back door after trying unsuccessfully to make a name for himself with the Celtics (2017-19). He signed a minimum contract of just over two million dollars, a risky bet since he had to pay to get out of his contract with Real Madrid. But, in any case, it was an exercise of faith by a player convinced that his place is in the best league in the world. For now, he is proving that this is the case: more than 23 minutes per night on the court with averages of almost 10 points and 5.2 rebounds (and a valuable 39.3% in threes).

The Liberty Ballers blog, a community with a strong following among Sixers fans, recalls the monologue of the historic Jason Kelce when the Eagles brought Philadelphia the Super Bowl in 2018: “Hungry dogs run faster,” said a unique player in the celebration of the title race of a team that was not among the big favorites at the start of that season. Nor, due to an injury to quarterback Carson Wentz, when the playoffs arrived and they had to face teams like the Falcons, the Vikings or the historic Patriots, whom they defeated in the Super Bowl.

Now, the Sixers are trying to apply that same “hungry dog runs faster” philosophy to players who have had or have a lot to prove, like Oubre and Yabusele. The former had to settle for a minimum contract in 2023. He played a great season (averaging over 15 points and 5 rebounds per game) and the Sixers gave him a nice pay rise this past summer: two years, $16.3 million and a player option at the end of this season. Oubre (28 years old) accepted a salary that fit into the Sixers' midlevel exception, which separated his contract from their salary cap margin (with which they signed Paul George and extended Tyrese Maxey in a big way), and will be able to seek a deal for more total money (with more seasons) next summer if he continues, as a high-level secondary player, playing at the level he has been doing in recent weeks.

Yabusele, for Liberty Ballers, is another one of those dogs that run faster than the others because they are hungry: “Before his poster dunk over LeBron at the Olympics, the NBA had forgotten about him, his NBA dream was dead. But years of improving his game on the other side of the Atlantic culminated in that great performance with France. Now, and like Oubre in his time, he is giving an incredible performance to the Sixers. With the new contract and the fearsome shadow of the second apron looming over the franchise, building a team requires more creativity than ever. And Daryl Morey has found a niche by taking advantage of market inefficiencies and signing players to minimum contracts that no one else is betting on, like Oubre last year or Yabusele now.”

The article claims that Yabusele has been “the team’s most consistent player night in and night out” so far this season, both as a small center and in his more natural role as a rebounding and scoring power forward: “He’s given the Sixers an ideal frontcourt player. One who can open the door, change matchups on defense, and has the versatility to play off or alongside Embiid.” Oubre and Yabusele are also the only two Sixers who haven’t missed a game this season.

A complicated situation awaits this summer

The Frenchman has been performing so well as a team player that there is already talk of his future in Philadelphia. He signed for just one year and for the minimum, so it seems obvious that it won’t be cheap to give him a new contract this summer. His teammate Andre Drummond made it clear after one of the team’s latest victories: “He’s the Best Sixth Man of the season. On July 1st he’s going to get a lot of money. Remember that you heard it from me first.”

So the Sixers are already thinking about how they can keep Yabusele, who will surely aspire to more than the minimum that next season would be set, in his case and if he remains with his current team, at around $2.7 million. The franchise’s big asset, beyond that, would be the midlevel margin, but in that case it would not be complete as happened this summer with Oubre, but rather the portion corresponding to the teams that pay luxury tax. The amount dropped this season, for example, from the $12.8 million of the total to around $5.1 million, which will be around $5.6 million next season. That would be a real path for the Sixers, who in principle will not have salary margin and who, therefore, would have to go this way or the minimum contract that will be, a priori, difficult for the player to accept unless he has no other choice. Of course, any offer above $6 million, from a team with salary cap room or more range in its midlevel, would bring a change of scenery closer to Yabusele, who otherwise seems happy with his sporting fit with the Sixers.

What kind of contract could Yabusele strike with the Sixers?

With Oubre, the Sixers went down the two-year deal with a player option after last season’s minimum contract to use their Bird rights to Oubre this summer, if needed, to sign him above the cap for as much as $62.6 million over four years. But the Sixers don’t have Bird rights with Yabusele, who will be an unrestricted free agent in the summer. Under the minimum option, they can only give Yabusele 120 percent more than his current salary on a new deal that could be for four years and start at $2.7 million. But if the Sixers stay below the second apron and have access to their midlevel of taxpayers, they will be able to offer Yabusele more — up to, at most, the aforementioned $5.7 million for next season.

It would be great for the Sixers if Yabusele signed, for example, a minimum of two years with an exit (player option) after the first season. That would be the great opportunity (summer of 2026) for the Frenchman to cash in, and the Sixers could then offer him around $60 million for four years (with early bird rights, 105% of the average salary in the League).

But, in any case, the best scenario of all for Yabusele is to continue playing at his current level and put himself out on the market, without restrictions, in the summer, and see what suits him. If there is not a better offer (there will not be many teams with salary cap space and most are very careful about what they do with the very valuable midlevel players), or he feels that the path is optimal with the Sixers, the door will open to continue in a team where he is very comfortable.

“They have been very positive with me from the beginning, giving me confidence every time I stepped on the court,” he admits. “Both the coaches and the players. They told me to shoot, not to think about it. Everything has been perfect since I arrived. They have given me a lot of love and I am channeling all that positive energy. That makes me want more and fight more.”