Sources have insisted that business negotiations will not interfere with basketball operations. Finalization and approval of any potential deal is still at least a week away, and during that time the team's basketball operations will have full control of basketball decisions.
On Wednesday at the Philadelphia College of Osteopathic Medicine, the Sixers held back-to-back workouts: the first with four draft prospects, the second with five.
The discussion, despite the elephant in the room of a potential franchise sale, remained strictly basketball.
The morning workout included four big men: Keith Benson (Oakland), Justin Harper (Richmond), Nikola Vucevic (USC), and Jordan Williams. The afternoon workout included five forwards and guards: Jordan Hamilton (Texas), Scotty Hopson (Tennessee), Malcolm Lee (UCLA), Josh Selby (Kansas), and Chris Singleton (Florida State).
Wednesday's workouts were the team's third and fourth of this pre-draft process. But they were also the most promising. The afternoon workout featured the highest-ranking prospects the team has hosted: Singleton (No. 10 on ESPN.com's prospect board), Hamilton (No. 13), and Selby (No. 18).
But considering the Sixers are almost certainly in the market for a big man, the most important prospect present might have been Vucevic, a 6-foot-10 big man originally from Montenegro by way of the University of Southern California.
The Sixers also interviewed Vucevic at the NBA Draft combine in Chicago.
"They say they need size and presence inside," Vucevic said after Wednesday's workout. "They say they have interest in me, so I was just coming here and trying to show what I can do and help this team. We had a good meeting, twice. So it's been good."
Iguodala's take. For the last half decade, Sixers swingman Andre Iguodala has been the face of the franchise. And in one small way, he's had something in common with owner Ed Snider: he's always caught a significant amount of flak from fans.
