Two hours before the Sixers hosted Orlando in an exhibition game last Friday, a 17-year-old fan named Lenny was camped out at the top of the ramp leading to the players’ parking lot, outside whatever it is
they’re calling the home arena these days.
This is hardly unusual. Autograph-seekers like Lenny regularly stake out this territory, before and after games. They do it in all kinds of weather, and deep into the night. Lenny had never before done so, however.
“I just wanted to try it out, because my friends have done it,” he said. “I just wanted to try to get some autographs, to see if I could make a collection.”
So there he was, wearing a Joel Embiid jersey over his hoodie. To that point he had coaxed Justin Edwards and Dominick Barlow into signing. Still miles to go on that front, then. And miles to go as far as the team is concerned. The Sixers’ fortunes will still largely hinge on the availability of Embiid and Paul George, two guys with bloated contracts and blotchy medical histories.
Lenny, for his part, is undeterred.
“We’re going to try to come back this season and play better,” he said, glancing ever so hesitantly back at last year’s 24-58 finish. “We drafted a new player, VJ Edgecombe. He’s pretty good. And Embiid, he’s getting healthier. We’ll do better this season, when he comes back.”
Hey, from his lips to Nick Nurse’s ears. Speaking of which, the Sixers coach, in his pregame remarks to reporters just a few minutes later that night, mentioned that he is attempting to establish “more of a passing kind of culture” this season. At other times this preseason, he has discussed playing three guards or two bigs. (Obviously he can do both at the same time, should he choose to do so.)
The point here is that like Lenny, Nurse wants to believe that better things are ahead. That Embiid and George will be available more often than last year, when they appeared in 19 and 41 games, respectively. That the team can be more cohesive, more competitive.
So why not implement an offensive approach that, as Nurse said, features “more passing, more spacing, more guys handling”?
“I think the ball always energizes people, right?” he said. “And I think that gets us to play better defense, rebound better, all that kind of stuff.”
Left unsaid is that this type of share-the-wealth system could work, even when the biggest stars aren’t available – that it could be something we’ll see not only when Embiid and George are out, but after they’re gone for good.
But first things first: How could it impact the current edition of the team? And more pointedly, how has Embiid taken to it? He is, after all, a guy who likes to spot up at the elbows and go to work. It is at times a laborious process – he diddles, he pump fakes, he jab-steps, etc. – but for the most part it has worked for Embiid, who by all accounts was moving well in Sunday’s Blue-White scrimmages.
But now Nurse would like to see the big guy swing the ball and get others involved.
“It’s a bit of a departure away from the way he plays,” the coach admitted, adding that to date there have been “some ups and downs” when it comes to his center’s fit in the new scheme.
Same for Tyrese Maxey, who according to Nurse came up to him after the first preseason game against the Knicks in Abu Dhabi and said, “I didn’t feel like I had the ball enough.”
“That was about as free and easy as you played offense that I can remember,” Nurse told him.
And indeed, Maxey notched 14 points in 23 minutes.
“You did that without dribbling in circles for 20 seconds and trying to find something, and like running into brick walls,” Nurse told him. “You just were really moving and free.”
Maxey would add 16 in a little under 18 minutes in a rematch with the Knicks two days later, then dropped in 17 while playing only the first quarter against the Magic.
“We all know that he’s going to be on the ball quite a bit, right?” Nurse said. “And he’s going to get a lot of pressure when he’s on the ball. But we also saw how good he was off the ball last year, and we need to be able to incorporate both those things.”
Here’s the bottom line: Maxey is a scorer, not a true point guard. The Sixers, in fact, have only two lead guards on their roster in the unproven Kennedy Chandler (who may or may not make the team) and 20-year veteran Kyle Lowry (who seems unlikely to play a key on-court role). They need to find connectivity in other ways, especially when Embiid and George aren’t out there.
It might be the only hope they have, the only reason fans like Lenny will have to truly believe. Otherwise it could very well be a long, cold winter, and not just for the autograph hounds standing out in the elements.
