New roster structure stronger and better

CAMDEN, N.J. >> The second most difficult part of a sports plan is to set one in motion. The most difficult is to acknowledge as quickly as possible that it did not work. To that, Elton Brand has gone 2-for-2.

By the final third of the last 76ers season, after so many years of disaster, Brand and the Sixers finally thought they had it right. They believed they had an All-Star starting five, sufficient scorers to win a spot in the NBA Finals, and, as Brett Brown kept saying, adults in the room.

Soon, though, they would also realize they had problems.

They had the wrong lockerroom mix.

They had the wrong structure at the one position, center, on which they would endeavor to construct an enduring championship framework.

They had too many players on contracts either about to expire or requiring extension.

They had too many shooters and not enough shots.

The result: Fewer regular-season wins than the year before, and not one additional round of postseason penetration. It never worked. Not as planned. “Not as well as we should have,” Tobias Harris was saying Friday at the training complex. “We had very good spurts, but they really weren’t sustainable for us. And I felt like we got out of it probably as much as we could have with the different types of games, different types of personalities and whatnot.

“We needed more time. We

needed more cohesiveness. And that’s something that we have now.”

Harris arrived at the last trade deadline, did what he could to share the spotlight with Jimmy Butler and the ball with J.J. Redick, then drifted into free agency. But he wasn’t in it long before Brand outlined a plan that included paying him $180,000,000 for five years and not paying Butler $190,000,000 for five years. It included recruiting Al Horford to both replace Butler’s veteran presence and provide a more sensible complement for Joel Embiid. It would replace Redick with Josh Richardson, who doesn’t shoot as well or as often, but who is an expert defender. It would include stuffing the center depth chart with Kyle O’Quinn.

And, mostly, it would all be done at once, in the summer, with firm and mostly lengthy commitments.

“They nailed it,” Josh Harris, the owner, said of his basketball high command, not taking a swipe at the Phillies’ pitching rotation. “They really hit it out of the park.”

That’s what the Sixers projected Friday when they assembled their new players and some of their resigned leftovers for some questioning and photos. They projected a roster that made sense at every turn, one that will invite Tobias Harris to take more shots and one that will enable Embiid to be fresher in the playoffs. Left unsaid was that they’d determined that Butler, who took critical shots late in games and behind doors verbally at his coaches, was less important than Horford.

They could not afford, not again, to enter another NBA postseason and try to back up Embiid with the useless Jonah Bolden, the immobile Boban Marjanovic and the under-sized Mike Scott. So if he had to go in order to finance $109,000,000 to secure Horford for four years, then the Sixers weren’t worrying about providing Butler with a farewell tour.

“When we went into it last year, we hoped Jimmy had found a great fit,” said Brand, who’d traded Dario Saric and Robert Covington for a half-a-season of Butler. “I would make that trade

again. He gave us a great playoff run. But we were able to get a player like Josh Richardson, and it also allowed us to get a player like Al Horford as well. I was not at all upset with that trade.”

Embiid has been often injured throughout his pro and college career. And the Sixers remain committed to the sports science that demands he be rested at times during the regular season to be fresh in the spring. With Horford, who can play strong forward or center, and O’Quinn, a useful, mobile, 6-10 veteran, the Sixers can survive any short-term absence of Embiid, Brown’s so-labeled “crown jewel.”

“From a roster implementation standpoint, and with the style we want to play, it feels like the right fit,” Brand said. “Al can play with him, but the opportunity to have him back Joel up at the five, especially in the playoffs, will be very helpful. Kyle O’Quinn can also step in and help. That was a big hole that we had last year, and we corrected that. The versatility of this lineup is important. We have multiple players who can play multiple positions.”

The Sixers know they will miss Butler late in games. Had they brought him back, it had a chance to work after a full training camp and regular season. But his relationship with Brown was, at best, one of professional tolerance. So Brand added a defensive presence to replace Redick. He built center depth. He freed Tobias Harris from the unspoken obligation to make sure Butler had enough shots. He freed Ben Simmons from Butler’s demand to be the late-game point guard.

And unlike last season, he did that up front, not on the fly.

“We want to be a team that’s going to have fun playing out there with one another,” Tobias Harris said. “We want to be connected as a group. I am excited for that.”

It wasn’t easy. But that excitement, and the way it developed, finally has a chance to endure.

To contact Jack McCaffery, email him at jmccaffery@21stcenturymedia.com; follow him on Twitter @JackMcCaffery