76ers Interest in CJ McCollum is Nothing but Made Up Rumors

NBA Twitter went into a frenzy on New Year's day as a questionable source sent out a tweet regarding an on-air report by ESPN's NBA Insider, Adrian Wojnarowski. According to the Twitter user, Wojnarowski, who is popularly known as 'WOJ' in the sports world, reported that there were multiple teams interested in potentially trading for Portland Trail Blazers guard, CJ McCollum.

One of the teams who were reportedly interested happened to be the Philadelphia 76ers. Considering the Sixers have made themselves quite relevant in the trade market after multiple splashes last season, it wouldn't come as a surprise they have an interest in shaking up the roster once again.

However, Sixers' general manager Elton Brand seemed quite content with his re-built roster just last week. And as it turns out, the trade rumors never had any legs anyway. According to NBC Sports Philadelphia's Paul Hudrick, the rumors are nothing but a made-up lie -- and tons of people fell for it without any further research.

Just to save people time and energy I wasted, Woj did not say on ESPN that the Sixers are interested in C.J. McCollum. The Rose Bowl is on both ESPN and ESPN2.
— Paul Hudrick (@PaulHudrick) January 2, 2020

Considering the "report" came out on ESPN on New Year's day, the timing raised some eyebrows. With college football bowl games being broadcasted, it didn't really make much sense hearing that an NBA report with nothing but rumors would cut into such an important broadcast for ESPN.

Plus, the Blazers have said in the past that they aren't interested in separating their dangerous duo of McCollum and his fellow guard, Damian Lillard, according to NBC Sports Northwest's, Jamie Hudson. And they showed their willingness to keep the two together by inking McCollum to a three-year extension, creating five total years left on his deal in Portland.

While McCollum could help the Sixers in a major way on the offensive side of the ball, there's a very slim chance a deal actually happens. Even if the Sixers did have an interest, a deal couldn't get done until the end of January. By then, the Sixers could already be moving a completely different direction as a team.