Amongst many of the goals set by the Philadelphia 76ers to ensure that season wouldn’t be as disastrous as last, was Paul George trying to get back to himself. After a first year in Philly that saw all
of his production averages plummet, he wanted to show he could still earn the three years of max contract money the Sixers still owed to him.
“That’s what they signed me for,” George said back at Media Day, “is to come in and be the Paul George that they recruited last summer.”
Obviously, a big determiner in that is health — it’s how George went on to finish that exact sentence. The idea of a bounce back became easier to roll eyes at when George re-aggravated the same knee injury that hampered him from much of last season.
That caused him to miss the first 12 games of this season. Since George has taken the court though, he’s looked a lot more like the player the Sixers signed in the summer of 2024. In his first 10 games this year, he’s already a third of the way to as many 30-point games as he had all of last season, and his season averages look much better as well.
The 17.1 points he’s averaging isn’t quite a full point higher than his 16.2 mark last year, but he’s doing so on one less shot a game and he’s gone from shooting 35% from three last season to a scalding 43% this season.
George’s biggest impact so far since taking the court this season has been his help in stabilizing Philly’s defense. When they started the year 4-0, they did so despite having one of the worst defensive groups in the league. They went out every night trying to outrun and outshoot every team, and they did so for as long as that was able to work.
Not only have they stabilized since then, they’ve actually become a good unit on that end of the floor. Not only are the Sixers a top-10 defense since, they’ve been downright excellent since George has gotten into a rhythm.
Earlier, this very blog discussed the Sixers’ defensive improvement and here, we’ll see just how tied to George that has been. In their last eight games, seven of which George has played in, the Sixers have been second in the league in defensive rating. Per Cleaning the Glass, the Sixers allow only allow 105.9 points per 100 possessions, which would put them in the 95th percentile in the league.
Not only has he added length to the perimeter the team has missed since Kelly Oubre Jr. went down with an injury, George has been the perfect steadying presence for a group that has defensive talent. He’s been captaining the unit while still being able to cause plenty of disruption himself, still averaging 1.4 steals per game.
It’s been particularly fun to watch George and VJ Edgecombe wreak havoc on opposing backcourts together. Per Cleaning the Glass, they only allow 103.1 points per 100 possessions.
How responsible he’s been for the defensive turnaround is more than the proof of life many were asking for him throughout the offseason. His scoring production might be returning to more PG-like performances as well. He’s seemed more comfortable getting to his spots on that end. After stringing together some decent shooting nights, he exploded for 35 points against the Atlanta Hawks Sunday.
George still wants to show the NBA that he still has something left in the tank. Down in Atlanta he talked to Ky Carlin of Sixerswire about fighting the washed allegations, for those interested. There still might not be a lot of folks willing to take on the rest of that contract, but the Sixers don’t need them too. They just need him to look more and more like Paul George again.
