Fultz eager to broaden his skills — and his mind
CAMDEN, N.J. » With the stated intention to be the best professional player in the history of basketball, Markelle Fultz had to begin someplace. So he would begin it Thursday at the 76ers’ training complex, and he would begin it with an open mind. For that, he would use his first NBA practice — or something close to it — not to impress the assembled coaches and assistants who’d last week made him the No. 1 overall pick in the NBA draft. Instead, he would use it to learn basketball tricks he hadn’t already known. Such as? “Everything,” Fultz said. “That would be from the fundamentals up to how we are going to play defense. Offensively, it was learning about players, learning their scoring areas and where they like to score from. Things like that.”
Fultz had just practiced with the Sixers’ summer league team, which will open play next week, first in Utah, then in Las Vegas. Though the formal workout was closed to the press, the consensus from inside was that he was impressive in the way he can score and share the ball. And so, it is on: The certain-to-be day-to-day monitoring of what should be the final prize from the Sixers’ four-year process to accept losing in exchange for high draft choices.
Though several more seasoned Sixers were in the building and in workout gear — Joel Embiid, Jahlil Okafor, Nik Stauskas, Ben Simmons and Robert Covington among them — Fultz worked only with a summer roster of talented if unlikely pro prospects. And not that the Sixers would have been in a mood or position to have disapproved of his first official workout, but they were impressed by Fultz’s reluctance to bigtime the ordeal.
“He really had the to want to learn,” said assistant coach Billy Lange, who will coach the ability summer team. “He asked a lot of questions. A lot of times when guys come in with his pedigree or reputation, they are afraid to ask what they may think are simple or basic questions. But regardless of who the coach was, he was eager to want to learn. He was just coming up, finding any way that he could fit in.
“It is going to be exciting to coach him over these next few weeks.”
Fultz has not formally signed his NBA contract, which, by rookie scale, will guarantee him approximately $5.9 million in the first of three seasons guaranteed to yield $20.9 million. He did acknowledge getting “some stuff signed” that allowed him to participate in what will be a three-day mini-camp, followed by the dual summer leagues. Such early accommodations are not unique; they do, however, underline Fultz’s willingness to begin his transition into the pro game.
Among his early eyeopeners were the precision with which the Sixers — like all NBA teams — teach defense. And for Brett Brown, who watched Thursday from the sideline, Fultz’s immediate playing time will be linked to his ability and willingness to defend.
“They had different plays,” Fultz said. “And they have a way they play defense. I just want to be the best player I can be. And in order to do that I have to run the plays to the best of my ability. If I don’t know how to do something, I am not going to hesitate to ask the question.”
At 19, and with just one year of college experience on an under-performing University of Washington team, Fultz may be less than immediately ready to win backcourt playing time from Simmons, Stauskas, T.J. McConnell, Jerryd Bayless or others. Yet that’s why he is using the summer to broaden his skills, not just his brand.
“He wanted specific details,” Lange said. “It may have been about the offense, or the plays, or what he does after he passes the ball here, or what he should be looking for. And he was really good about picking something up just off a whiteboard and being able to actually apply it to live scrimmaging.”
Though Brown prefers, or at least trends toward, position-free basketball, it was notable Thursday that Fultz identified himself as a point guard. That would be an indication of the Sixers’ summer league plans, though Brown has stressed that he will hand the ball to Simmons in training camp.
Either way, Fultz satisfied.
“I want to do anything the team needs me to do to win,” he said. “So if that’s what they need, then will be that’s what I am looking forward to.”
He was the No. 1 overall pick, a league-wide curiosity, a player already having targeted Michael Jordan as a player whose career accomplishments he expects to surpass. That won’t be easy. But he’s already showing that he doesn’t expect it to be. One day into his new job, that said more than any dunk, shot or boast.