Philadelphia 76ers managing partner Josh Harris stood before reporters Thursday, May 14, and did not sugarcoat the pain of another early playoff exit. Just 48 hours after firing Daryl Morey, Harris named Bob Myers to oversee basketball operations and lead the search for a new day-to-day leader.
“All right, good afternoon. Thank you for being here,” Harris began. “Tuesday was a difficult day for me. I consider Daryl Morey a friend and he did a lot of positive things for our franchise. We made the playoffs five of six years including the conference semi-finals four of those seasons.”
Harris highlighted the foundation built under Morey: the drafting of Tyrese Maxey and VJ Edgecombe as core pieces, plus a robust future asset haul of seven first-round picks and 12 second-round selections over the next seven years. He wished Morey and his family well, then turned the page.
“Bob Myers will oversee basketball and run the process to identify a new day-to-day leader,” Harris stated. He praised Myers’ résumé — four NBA championships and two Executive of the Year awards — and said he looks forward to Myers, the new hire, and head coach Nick Nurse working together next season.
Harris spoke directly to the fan base that has waited decades for a championship. “To our fans, I want you to know no one’s more frustrated than me that we haven’t achieved our goals,” he said. “I care deeply for the city and the team. I acknowledge how disappointing it is that we’ve not made it past the second round of the playoffs. We owe it to you and the city to be better.”
Myers, the former Golden State Warriors architect now serving as president of HBSE Sports, echoed the gratitude and urgency. “I also want to share my gratitude for Daryl,” he offered. “I take it very seriously. This city is a passionate fan base. This is a blue blood organization and so to get put in this position is a privilege.”
Myers made clear the organization’s singular goal. “I only take these jobs to win a championship,” he said. “I think players, if they’re being honest, only play to win a championship. Nobody’s saying that we wanted to get swept in the second round.”
The 76ers finished the 2025-26 regular season 45-37, seventh in the Eastern Conference. They upset the Boston Celtics in a grueling seven-game first-round series before being swept 4-0 by the Knicks. Myers acknowledged both the progress and the gap.
“There’ll be one happy team at the end of this season. Just one,” he noted. “We’re one of the 29 that didn’t win the championship this year. Our season’s over. And so you have to acknowledge the why of that and how did we get here?”
He described the challenge of moving from “good to great,” a transition that requires risk. “When you’re good, you have to risk something to go to great,” Myers explained. “You risk making a mistake and falling back to bad.” He challenged the roster directly: “Do you want to get uncomfortable? Because it takes a great level of uncomfortability to win a championship.”
Myers outlined the qualities he will prioritize in the next leader: character, leadership, front-facing responsibilities, star-player management, contract negotiations, draft acumen, analytics, and medical oversight. “I’m looking to find someone that can check as many of those boxes as possible,” he said, “but also raise their hand and say, you know what, I’m actually not good in this space. I’m going to need some support.”
On the roster questions swirling around 32-year-old Joel Embiid and 35-year-old Paul George — both on max contracts — Myers deferred final philosophy to the new hire but promised honest evaluation. “How do you feel about our roster?” he plans to ask candidates. “That’s going to be the next leading up to the draft. What do we need to draft? What are we missing?”
The 76ers hold the 22nd pick in the upcoming draft. Myers and the staff are already working in Chicago. He emphasized autonomy for the new executive while promising high-level collaboration with ownership and himself.
Harris closed the luxury-tax debate once and for all. “The front office absolutely has the green light to go into the luxury tax,” he said. “In fact, we’ve been in and out of the luxury tax. And so it’s not an issue.”
Both men stressed the same message: the time for incremental steps is over. Myers put it plainly: “We’re going to demand that. I’m going to demand that of whoever we hire. I’m going to do that myself because I just don’t know how to not do it.”
For a franchise and fan base exhausted by second-round exits, Thursday’s press conference delivered something rare — raw accountability paired with a clear plan forward. The search begins now. The 22nd pick is weeks away. And the standard, as both Harris and Myers made unmistakably clear, is no longer making the playoffs. It is winning a championship.
