Sixers done riding tank
Visit C’s as playoff contenders
Philadelphia comes to town tonight with a much different tail wind than in past years.
Tanking no longer is the operative term for a team that has systematically collected young talent through high draft picks, accepted short-term losing and waited out key injuries.
But no more. Joel Embiid has successfully spun the derisive term “tanking” into the far softer-sounding “process,” and suddenly the Sixers had the fifth-best record in the Eastern Conference heading into last night’s home game against Washington.
Mention of how the Sixers got there made Al Horford wince, but the Celtics center also had an admission.
“I think it worked out pretty good. Those guys, it worked out real well,” he said yesterday with a laugh. “That’s not the way you want to do it, but it worked out great. You have a guy like Joel Embiid, you have Ben Simmons, you have a lot of great players over there. Then you bring in some veterans — J.J. Redick, Amir Johnson — and all of a sudden you’re a playoff team. The future is very bright for them.”
Though Simmons is nursing an ankle injury (it’s unclear whether he will play tonight), the potential Sixers lineup has more than just Horford talking about it as a playoff team.
Still, there’s a slight aftertaste from the way Philadelphia reached this point.
“I don’t know if it’s the conventional way of the way things have been done through NBA history, but it’s working for them where they had some high talent come in,” Kyrie Irving said. “And they drafted well, and had guys that may not have played their first seasons due to injuries or something like that, but when they’re on the floor, they’re pretty effective.
“So it’s just a great group of young guys that are trying to develop and niche a spot for themselves in this league, and they’re doing a great job of that. They continue to get better, and they maximize their talent. And Coach (Brett) Brown does an unbelievable job as well of maximizing talents and knowing who the offense is going to go through, and defensively staying on them. When you’re young like that, you can easily lose focus. But Brett stays on them.”
Another basement finish, and Brown’s patience might have given out. But patience and a love of coaching young players is how the native of South Portland, Maine, has survived.
He, above all, should enjoy the fruits of the socalled process now.
“Brett’s incredible. Brett, you all know because you interview him when he comes to town, some of you have known him from his time in Boston,” C’s coach Brad Stevens said. “He’s got such a great energy and positivity about him. He comes back to work every day, you can tell, and does so with a great fervor.
“He’s a really good basketball coach, and obviously doesn’t change through circumstances. He just keeps going, and I’ve got a lot of respect for Brett.”
Stevens, asked about the process, pointed to the results.
“I think Philly’s got a really good team. I think they’ve been really well-coached for a long time,” he said. “They have good young talent. They obviously have endured misfortune when you think about Simmons missing all the year last year, (Markelle) Fultz some of the year this year thus far, and then Embiid has missed a bunch of his first three years. If those guys are all healthy, they probably would have won a lot more games before this year.
“They’re a really good basketball team. They’ve done a great job, I think, of going out and getting the right veterans, when you look at Redick’s having a phenomenal year and Amir. We know what Amir brings to a team, what he means to a team. Then the other part is like a guy like (Robert) Covington or (Richaun) Holmes that were late draft picks or guys that weren’t drafted that have really developed within their system. It’s a credit to them that they’ve kind of stuck with it and all really, really improved.”