Last night, the Ringer released an explosive report alleging that Sixers GM Bryan Colangelo operated several burner accounts to take anonymous shots at former GM Sam Hinkie and current Sixers players.
February, The Ringer received an anonymous tip that Bryan Colangelo, the Philadelphia 76ers’ president of basketball operations, had been secretly operating five Twitter accounts. Since then, we have scrutinized and archived those accounts in an attempt to verify the source’s claims that the longtime NBA executive has been using them as a platform to:
Criticize NBA players, including Joel Embiid, Jahlil Okafor, and Nerlens Noel
Publicly debate the decisions of his own coaching staff, as well as critique former Sixers general manager Sam Hinkie and Toronto Raptors president Masai Ujiri
Telegraph the 2017 trade in which the Sixers acquired the no. 1 overall pick that would become Markelle Fultz
Disclose nonpublic medical information about Okafor and gossip about Embiid and Fultz to members of the national and Philadelphia media
Thanks to Rich Hofmann of The Athletic Philadelphia it was discovered that one of the burner accounts, Eric Jr., was active during a Colangelo press conference, replying to others, which would reasonably rule out Colangelo as the person who ran the account.
Looking back, Bryan Colangelo held a media availability right before the Heat game on February 11, 2017 to address Joel Embiid’s (previously undisclosed) torn meniscus. From looking at the timestamps, it seems like during that time, Eric Jr was also tweeting during that session. pic.twitter.com/9Q1JOdrXZW
— Rich Hofmann (@rich_hofmann) May 31, 2018
Earlier today, Twitter user, @legsanity, floated around the idea that Colangelo’s wife, Barbara Bottini may have been the person running the accounts.
https://twitter.com/legsanity/status/1001925632387964928
Side theory @legsanity and I sort of meshed: could Eric Jr account be Barbara Bottini, BC's wife? Account follows several Toronto HS/prep accounts — she was on school board there. Account big on U of Chicago, son's school/team.
Also was influential in BC hiring D'Antoni. pic.twitter.com/favNTK6cuL
— Jimmy (@_JimmyMcCormick) May 30, 2018
https://twitter.com/legsanity/status/1001944119940386816
And then Legsanity appeared to find the most damning piece of evidence.
https://twitter.com/DidTheSixersWin/status/1001982391106318343
https://twitter.com/legsanity/status/1001986216395464704
While the phone number could be a coincidence, all of the math currently adds up to Colangelo’s wife being behind the burner accounts. As of now Colangelo is denying that he had any access to the accounts and that “someone is out to get him”
Bryan Colangelo tells me via text: "Someone's out to get me. … This is clearly not me." Colangelo adds that he's "hopeful to resolve this soon."
— Jordan Schultz (@Schultz_Report) May 30, 2018
h/t Dime On Uproxx