Sixers-Heat match is tale of two processes
Heat’s win-at-all-cost approach under Riley, Spoelstra goes up against the 76ers’ tanking strategy that led to many high draft picks.
Dave George: Philly was happy to be terrible for years, while Miami has always tried to do its best.
Miami’s opponent in the opening round of the NBA playoffs finished 10-72 a couple of years ago.
Too bad Philadelphia didn’t just go ahead and lose 76 games while they were in full tank mode, matching the 76ers team logo with the front office’s brazen philosophy of losing by design.
“Trust the Process” became the chant of many Philly fans, though not all, because the pursuit of the highest-possible draft picks through low-possible expenditure of energy is never going to feel right or admirable.
It’s banking on a reward without any risk. It’s lazy, and anyone who gets behind that needs to stop what they’re doing right now and take a lap. Or 20.
Boy, this is starting to sound angry, and really I’m not. A little sad that it’s working maybe, but that’s all.
Pro franchises can operate any way they wish as long as there’s enough money to keep
the owners in corporate jets and the customers just short of swearing off their product forever.
The Miami Marlins are going through their own “process” now, with all the stars and their big contracts shipped away and a new blueprint that, even if it brings success, will be more like black-and-blue for years to come.
Something like that worked for the Houston Astros, who went from rags to 2017 World Series champions, and something like that will work again some day for another team.
Tonight, however, when Game 1 of the series between the 76ers and the Heat matches all of that slow-perk personnel manipulation against the stubborn win-today, win-everyday “culture” that drives every Pat Riley project, the whole league will be taking careful notes on what really works.
That’s because the Sixers are nearing what is supposed to be the payoff of their five-year plan. Joel Embiid and Ben Simmons, a couple of raw lottery picks to start, have grown into a powerful combination. Markelle Fultz, the No. 1 overall pick in last year’s draft, has also benefited greatly from his on-the-job training at the age of 19.
Altogether we’re looking at a 52-win team, seeded one spot higher in the Eastern Conference than LeBron James’ Cleveland Cavaliers and desirous of talking LeBron into joining up this summer.
Embiid is the 7-foot tent-pole supporting the whole scheme. He had a broken foot when the Sixers drafted him with the third overall pick in 2014 and didn’t play at all for his first two pro seasons. That was fine, though, because the Sixers didn’t need him then, not when losing was winning.
They need him now, with his average output of 22.9 points and 11 rebounds, and are feeling a little anxious because of a fractured orbital bone that reportedly will keep the big man out for Game 1.
So what? That’s what they’re saying in the Heat offices, because it’s what they say to every obstacle.
Miami could have settled softly into the draft lottery last season after an 11-30 start but coach Erik Spoelstra and his not-ready-for-prime-time players made a spot in the playoffs their patently unrealistic goal instead. Almost made it, too, falling short on a tiebreaker alone.
This year was another kind of last-minute rush. Rather than dropping games in the complicated dance to match up with injury-riddled Boston in the first round, the Heat went all out to beat Toronto in overtime on the final night of the regular season. Winning is simply in Miami’s DNA, or at least busting a gut in the pursuit of it is.
Long-term injuries to leaders like Dion Waiters don’t change that. A lack of true stars doesn’t, either. Spoelstra mixes and matches his lineups according to the matchup problem of the moment, and if he doesn’t have somebody great to plug into a particular situation, he turns to somebody who is good to go.
That’s the fun part. The Big Three may be long gone but in its place there’s The Big We, and that’s a pretty formidable bunch.
What is the best that could come out of this? The brackets tell the story.
If Miami can get past the Sixers, the next opponent would be Boston or Milwaukee. The Celtics are missing Kyrie Irving and even more. And if it’s a second-round series against the Bucks, the Heat would have home-court advantage.
Meanwhile, Toronto and Cleveland, the two teams Miami probably can’t beat in a seven-game series, are on the other side of the Eastern bracket. Not until the conference finals could they be in the Heat’s way. Silly to start looking that far, but no sillier than the Sixers assuming the path is being cleared for them instead.
It’s like one of these two teams is being handed a golden opportunity, so let’s reset the story line.
You’ve got Philly, a franchise that was satisfied to sell its fans three seasons of garbage in return for a promised feast, and Miami, the team that knows each longtime customer comes to the arena to see victories, and the team that believes the customer is always right.
Hey, I’m not in charge of where destiny comes down on stuff like this, but it sure seems like every close game in this series ought to go to the guys who take this championship chase seriously year after year, even when it doesn’t make the most business sense, and even when it makes no sense at all.