Tag: Philadelphia 76ers
Analysis

5 NBA Teams Are 4-1. They’re Completely Different.

- by Fox Doucette

As the NBA heads into the 2021 calendar year, the 76ers, Pacers, Magic, Clippers, and Suns are all 4-1, tied for first in their respective conferences. Indeed, the Magic were the last unbeaten holdout, winning their first four games before losing to Philadelphia on New Year’s Eve. But if five games have taught us anything, there’s more than one way to win four out of five in professional basketball. Let’s take a look at the five best teams in the league as of ten days into the season and see what they have in common…and what makes no sense about …

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Analysis

Allen Iverson: The Most Overrated NBA Player Ever

- by Fox Doucette

Allen Iverson is a Hall of Famer, an 11-time All-Star, a 4-time scoring champion, a 3-time leader in steals, a 7-time All-NBA selection, the 2001 MVP…and the most overrated player who ever lived, a guy who if someone with his same game came into the league today, he would be immediately sent to the G-League until he figured out how not to shoot his team out of games and play the most hideously inefficient basketball ever seen from a star player in the history of the league. Iverson was the ultimate thirsty scorer. All the criticisms being leveled against James …

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2020 Preview

Are the 2019-20 Philadelphia 76ers Good?

- by Fox Doucette

The Philadelphia 76ers have Processed their way from a 10-72 season in 2015-16, the second-worst 82-game mark not only in franchise history but of all time, to back-to-back 50-win seasons and second-round playoff appearances. Last year’s edition went 51-31 and came one insane, improbable miracle shot from Kawhi Leonard away from the Eastern Conference Finals. This year’s team is minus Jimmy Butler (gone to the Heat) but added Al Horford and Josh Richardson to a “big three” of Tobias Harris, Ben Simmons, and Joel Embiid. Some people say that’s the kind of lineup that will win you the East if …

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Analysis

NBA Best And Worst Contracts Part I: Atlantic Division

- by Fox Doucette

We have talked extensively on the subject of Wiggins Factor, a formula designed to relate NBA salary to Win Shares on a per-minute basis and determine which players provide the most bang for the buck in terms of powering good teams to titles…or, by contrast, the players who are such a waste of money that every minute they’re on the floor all they do is bring your team closer to the draft lottery. But now it’s time to pull all the data together from across the league and give all those raw numbers some context. Over the next six days, …

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Editorial

Dell Demps, Sam Hinkie, and the Meaning of NBA Genius

- by Fox Doucette

  Dell Demps just managed to do completely by accidental bumbling what Sam Hinkie did by deliberate, willful arrogance, and in the Process managed to prove once and for all that the gods have one heck of a sense of humor. After all, what difference is it truly between New Orleans being a garbage fire for years under an incompetent GM, lucking into a couple of top draft picks, and rebuilding the franchise into a contender under a smarter GM, and Philadelphia being a garbage fire for years under an incompetent GM, whiffing on a bunch of draft picks and …

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Highlights

Breakfast Special: Kawhi Leonard’s Driveway Heroics

- by Fox Doucette

Every kid who has ever picked up a basketball has, in the driveway, counted down “3! 2! 1!” then launched a shot that beats the buzzer, leading the kid to yell “And the Celtics win the championship!” or whatever other team the kid’s growing up rooting for. But until Sunday, there had never been an actual Game 7 walk-off buzzer-beater to close out a series in NBA history. The only time it ever happened in a winner-take-all game—Michael Jordan‘s “The Shot” over Craig Ehlo in the first round in 1989—that was Game 5 of a best-of-five series. Every other example …

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Highlights

Breakfast Special: Let There Be Game 7

- by Fox Doucette

After a complete garbage first round that was as chalk as the White Cliffs of Dover, we’ve got ourselves the thrills and chills of Game 7 imminent in Toronto and Denver. The Philadelphia 76ers got an insane MVP-level performance from Joel Embiid on their way to a 112-101 win, and the matched set of 11-point victories got completed by the Portland Trail Blazers in a 119-108 win over Denver in the nightcap. We begin in Philadelphia. Drawing an Embiid on the Enemy Here’s your insane stat of the night. Embiid had 17 points on 5-of-14 shooting, pulled down 12 rebounds, …

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Highlights

Breakfast Special: Smash TV

- by Fox Doucette

Do you like closely-contested, intense playoff basketball that comes down to the wire and gives a thrilling finish? Well, tough. We’re fresh out. Can I interest you in a pair of one-sided beatdowns normally reserved for regular-season games against lottery teams instead? Nothing puts out the flames of an underdog in a seven-game series like losing Game 5, and the Raptors and Nuggets now get a chance to close out on the road before coming home where they’ll be heavily favored in Game 7 if that’s the way this whole show turns out. We begin in Toronto. DEFENSE! DEFENSE! To …

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Highlights

Breakfast Special: In Which Order Is Restored

- by Fox Doucette

Nothing shatters an in-six narrative quite like an underdog, up 2-1 and with a chance to lose Game 5 on the road before coming home and closing out their opponents, failing to do the one thing an underdog needs to do in order to win a playoff series. That’s right; the Sixers and Blazers couldn’t win a Game 4 at home. Toronto Raptors fans went from “crap, we’re going to lose on our home floor in Game 5 without Pascal Siakam” to “Conference Finals, here we come!” in as much time as it took Siakam to get some Mr. Miyagi …

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Highlights

Breakfast Special: Philly In-Six-Ers

- by Fox Doucette

One of the most fun parts (in that Nelson Muntz kind of way) of being a basketball journalist is watching the Hot Take Machine fire up during the first two games of a series, where a team that is excellent at home by virtue of being a top-two seed either holds serve and establishes nothing besides “this series might go 7” or loses one and opens up “road team in 6” talk (see headline.) There is absolutely nothing meaningful to be gleaned from a series until at least Game 3, when a combination of optics and stats tell us what …

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