Tyrese Maxey is making a leap and is fresh off a 29-point, eight-assist, eight-steal performance in a win over the lowly Pacers on Monday evening. Let’s lean into the energy Maxey is creating and do a “5
Sixers thoughts” column dedicated solely to him…
Maxey: All-Star Game starter and… future All-Star Game MVP?
No guard has been this type of lightning force for the Sixers since Allen Iverson’s peak. Iverson’s age-25 season saw him win NBA MVP honors and lead the Sixers to the Finals. While both of those things unfortunately feel a tad out of reach for Maxey in his own age-25 season, there was another accolade that Iverson picked up that year that Maxey could undoubtedly challenge for: All-Star Game MVP.
In a legendary bout at the 2001 All-Star Game in Washington, D.C., Iverson dropped 25 points to go with five assists and four steals as the East beat an ultra-stacked Western Conference squad. With Maxey’s first All-Star starting nod under his belt now for next month’s festivities, he could no doubt heat up and add an All-Star Game MVP Award to his mantle.
I need the New Balance Maxeys
I haven’t bought a pair of fresh basketball sneakers in a long time, settling more so into New Balance trainers and HOKAs for daily use as I’ve progressed into my 30s. That’s a reality check for sure. The era of me gobbling up Air Jordan 11s and 4s with busboy money at the turn of the 2010s is sadly long gone.
I may need to make an exception when Maxey’s first signature sneaker releases later in 2026, as news broke about that on Tuesday morning.
I don’t think anyone’s been in a rush to wear some Joel Embiid Sketchers, but, historically, from Charles Barkley to Iverson himself, Sixers players have had some legendary signature sneakers. I need Maxey to continue that tradition. Guards always have better designs than big men anyway…
Remember when…
A 20-year-old rookie Maxey played fewer minutes in the 2021 Eastern Conference Semifinals series against the Hawks (77) than Furkan Korkmaz (139) and 34-year-old George Hill (110)? Awesome stuff. I’m not still bitter or anything! It’s not like that series irrevocably changed my relationship with the Sixers as an entity and the sport of basketball as a whole or anything!
What I most want from Maxey this spring…
I am more of a Sixers pessimist than most even before last week’s skid. I am under no pretense that this team is making the Finals, but my true goal for the Sixers overall this season, and Maxey specifically, is for him to be the best player in a playoff series that the team wins. Sure, people far and wide would joke about it just being another second-round exit from a franchise famous for them, but the equation is so different than it has been at different points in the Joel Embiid era.
A first-round matchup that sees Maxey going nuclear and looking like one of the best players on the planet in victory could even warm my frozen Sixers soul.
The city needs to rally around Maxey more
Look, I know it’s an Eagles city and it always will be. I’m freaking out over who the next offensive coordinator will be just as much as anyone. The Phillies are pissing everyone off before pitchers and catchers even report though. The Flyers are sagging after their own promising start. The Sixers have the floor at the moment. Up-and-downs and injuries, per usual, have kept them from firmly establishing themselves as legitimate Eastern Conference contenders, but isn’t rooting for a guy like Maxey something we always wished for since the dawn of the post-Iverson era?
The Process years were all about establishing Embiid as one of the game’s greatest and while that panned out, it didn’t result in the team success we all dreamed it would bring about. That sucks, but that’s the reality of contention in the modern NBA. I understand people who are jaded and have tuned out since the collapses in 2021 and 2023 and the health setbacks that Embiid has had to endure, but isn’t this what it was all about? Watching an in-prime superstar command the court and make the extraordinary seem ordinary?
A magical run to the Finals isn’t happening in a few months, but what’s to say that’s not the case two years from now with an improved VJ Edgecombe as an elite running mate for this guy? I don’t have to convince the people who read this fine site of that, but I wish Philly felt at least a tad more all in on Maxey.
