Daryl Morey's Sixers Tenure Started With Excitement and Ended in Apathy

The Sixers parted ways with President of Basketball Operations Daryl Morey, they announced on Tuesday evening.

Nick Nurse will stay on as head coach for a fourth season in Philadelphia. For now, Elton Brand will retain his role as General Manager.

Bob Myers, the current President of Sports for Harris Blitzer Sports & Entertainment (HBSE), will be the interim President of Basketball Operations and lead the search for Morey's successor.

“I have a tremendous amount of respect for Daryl personally and professionally, and I’m grateful for his contributions over the last six seasons,” Harris said in a press release.

“After speaking with Daryl, we determined that it was time for a fresh start. Bob Myers will lead the process of identifying a new leader and I believe his experience in constructing four NBA championship teams will be a valuable resource to our organization.

“I know how much the 76ers mean to the City of Philadelphia, and it’s important we find the right leader to shape the future of this team,” Myers added. “The process will start immediately, and we will be thorough and deliberate in our evaluations. I believe this is a destination for top talent across the league and look forward to solidifying our infrastructure moving forward.”

Morey amassed a record of 270-212 over six regular seasons, with a 28-23 record across six postseasons.

As much as his teams enjoyed regular season success, his legacy here is complicated.

It was the summer of 2020 when the situation in Philadelphia looked dire. The Sixers had just been swept out of the first round of the playoffs by their rival Boston Celtics, Ben Simmons missing the playoffs with a knee injury.

The Sixers replaced the beloved Jimmy Butler with Al Horford. Butler was leading the underdog Miami Heat to the NBA Finals. Horford effectively stole money from the franchise. Tobias Harris vastly underwhelmed in his first season of a max contract. The team fit like a size 11 foot in a size eight shoe, and the best player was miserable for the entirety of the season.

Enter Morey (and Doc Rivers), who traded Horford (and draft capital and draft rights) and Josh Richardson (and draft rights) in seprate deals before the start of the 2020-21 season. In one of his first moves as the lead executive, Morey's front office drafted Tyrese Maxey. He undid a large chunk of the mess created in the 2019 offseason in less than three weeks, restoring hope amongst fans and building a team much better positioned to function going forward.

He then navigated the Sixers through the toxic Simmons exit and got James Harden back in the process.

Morey's final home run came in the summer of 2025, drafting prized rookie V.J. Edgecombe with the third overall pick.

Morey had some victories on the margins, like signing Georges Niang to what turned out to be a value contract as the sharpshooting forward became a fixture in the Sixers' rotation. He also pulled an in-his-prime Kelly Oubre Jr. from the late stages of free agency on a minimum contract. This past summer, he nabbed Dominick Barlow on a two-way contract, and Barlow wound up starting for the vast majority of the regular season.

But one of the themes of the Morey era was undoing his own wins.

There was Isaiah Joe, a Morey second-round draft pick who was cut from the roster, only to immediately be picked up by the Oklahoma City Thunder. He has since emerged into a key reserve on a championship team.

There was Paul Reed, a Morey second-round pick who developed into a playable center, only to be cut as part of offseason transactions two summers ago. He is now arguably the best center on a Detroit Pistons team fighting for a berth in the Eastern Conference Finals.

There was Julian Champagnie, who was cut so the Sixers could sign Mac McClung to participate in the dunk contest at All-Star Weekend. They never did hang the banner for McCllung wearing a Sixers jersey as he lifted the trophy. McClung is a perennial G-Leagueer, while Champagnie is a starter for a San Antonio Spurs team sitting one win away from the Western Conference Finals.

There was Jaden Springer, who was taken with the 28th pick in the 2021 draft while Herbert Jones, Miles McBride, Ayo Dosunmu and Neemias Queta still on the board. Springer is now in the G League.

But every executive has hits and misses.

Perhaps Morey's biggest flaw is the perpetual trail of players dissatisfied by how their time in Philadelphia ended.

It was a theme of his Houston days. Morey clung to Embiid, which made Simmons feel less valued. Morey treated Harden like a king until he felt he was no longer the crown jewel, leaving Harden feeling betrayed ahead of his free agency and again requesting a trade. Patrick Beverley felt like Morey had been dishonest with him leading up to his trade out of Philadelphia. Morey practically discarded fan-favorite second-year guard Jared McCain and then boldly minimized the departed guard in an effort to justify the trade. McCain is now making sure Philadelphians never forget that trade deadline, one 3-pointer for the Thunder at a time.

It is easy enough to pay Paul George a maximum contract when no one else is offering that. It is easy enough to wait out free agency and pick up bargains as the rest of the league runs out of money and roster spots. Morey's problems were always down the roster, both in building a team and in managing relationships with players. The top of the roster was always the priority.

Look no further than his last season in Philadelphia, when Morey's roster featured three players on max deals—two of whom played less than half the season each—while also carrying a rookie second-round pick who never played and two veteran guards they never intended on playing.

By Morey's final game, a 30-point home loss to the New York Knicks that capped a sweep in the second round of the playoffs, the roster had roughly four reliable players.

But make no mistake, the identity of the next lead executive matters very little if Harris and HBSE continue in their ways.

As we wrote on Sunday, management has cut costs four trade deadlines running.

They've long been about brand recognition.

Before there was Morey, a revolutionary of the way the game was played in the 2010s, there was Bryan Colangelo. Before there was Nurse, there was Doc Rivers, who was hired just before Morey was given the keys to the car. There was brand recognition when Morey targeted Harden in the Simmons trade. There was brand recognition when he gave PJ Tucker a three-year deal after Joel Embiid publicly yearned for the then Heat forward. There was brand recognition when Morey, after two consecutive seasons of shedding salary at the trade deadline, willingly put constraints on the roster to lure in George.

And now, there will be brand recognition with Bob Myers, at least temporarily.

Myers is known to be better at nurturing relationships down the roster than Morey was. His résumé certainly has more individual and team success than Morey's does. He drafted Harrison Barnes and Draymond Green to the Golden State Warriors and signed Andre Iguodala, putting the finishing touches on the core around Stephen Curry and Klay Thompson that won a title in 2015.

Myers was highly influential in the franchise prioritizing Thompson and decided to not trade him to the Minnesota Timberwolves in a deal that would've sent star big Kevin Love to the Bay Area.

Sure, he signed Kevin Durant in free agency in 2016. That was more a product of a massive spike in the salary cap than it was brilliance on Myers' part. He also botched two lottery picks in back-to-back drafts, squandering Golden State's transition from the end of the Curry era to whatever their future is once he retires. His final blunder in Golden State was inking Jordan Poole to one of the worst contracts in the sport.

Myers has architected some great teams. We'll see what his search turns up in the months to come. But since news first broke that Myers was taking the job with HBSE back in October, the Sixers' messaging has remained consistent—he wasn't there to wait out Morey's tenure and swoop in if Harris decided it was time for a change, he was there for international exposure with a global sports portfolio.

He will restore some faith in the organization. Perhaps most importantly to Harris, Myers serves as the first step toward a fresh start for a fanbase that had reached a breaking point between apathy and anger.

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