NBA commisioner: 76ers are not tanking
PHILADELPHIA – NBA commissioner Adam Silver does not believe the 76ers are intentionally losing games, despite the assertion made this week by former Orlando coach Stan Van Gundy.
At the MIT Sloan Sports Analytics Con- ference, in Boston, Van Gundy called the Sixers’ efforts this season “embarrassing,” challenging the quality of the players with whom they are playing and insinuating that the team is tanking for a chance at higher draft picks.
Van Gundy made his comments this week during a panel discussion, which Sixers general manager Sam Hinkie attended.
Silver, who was in town for Allen Iverson’s jersey retirement ceremony, chided Van Gundy.
“I don’t agree with Coach Van Gundy at all,” Silver said. “I just came from the locker room, just spoke with the coach. It’s an embarrassment to the whole entire league to suggest these guys are going out on the floor and not doing their very best to win games.
“Now, if what Stan Van Gundy is addressing is appropriate rebuilding, it’s what every organization goes through. And it’s not just sports. You look at any business, and you look at short-term results and long-term results, and if somebody told you a business was being operated quarter by quarter, you’d say, ‘That’s not a way to run a business. You need a strategy.’ What this organization is doing is exactly the right thing. What they’re doing is planning for the future.”
There’s a fine line between tanking and not. One is intentionally losing games, by missing uncontested shots, shaving points and the like. Silver assessed that the Sixers are “building from the ground up.”
“And if you look at what’s happened here over the last several years, it’s badly needed,” Silver said. “Somebody needed a vision to win here.”
In the 12 seasons since Iverson guided the 2000-01 Sixers to the NBA Finals, the team has had four winning seasons. None of those teams has advanced beyond the Eastern Conference semifinals, with the Sixers stuck in a rut of just being competitive enough to be eligible for the postseason.
Hinkie, who’s in his first season as GM, is overhauling the franchise in a bid to build it into a contender.
Unless, of course, you were to ask Van Gundy.
“I don’t care. Adam Silver can say there’s no tanking or what’s going on,” Van Gundy said of the Sixers, whose roster features nine of 15 players in either their first or second seasons. “If you’re putting that roster on the floor, you’re doing everything you can possibly do to try to lose.”
The Sixers have gone to the D-League well to quench their rim-protecting, shot-blocking thirst.
Jarvis Varnado, a 26-year-old forward, is the latest to get a 10-day deal from the Sixers, signing Saturday. The 6-10, 230-pounder was in uniform and available against Washington, going on what little he might have garnered from a pregame walk-through.
“I was surprised. It happened so quick,” said Varnado, who was coming off a 10-day deal with Chicago. “I didn’t sign a second 10-day with the Bulls, and it happened so fast that I didn’t have time to not think about not getting the second 10-day with the Bulls. I’m excited, and look forward to it.”
Varnado has appeared in only 14 NBA games since being the 41st overall pick in the 2010 draft. This season he was a DLeague All-Star with the Iowa Energy, for whom he averaged a league-best 4.7 blocks and a secondbest 11.0 rebounds to go with 14.1 points per game.
Brown should know by the end of next week whether Varnado is worth holding on to.
“In 10 days,” Brown said, “you can learn enough to make some level of a decision.”
The Mississippi State product has a pedigree of blocking shots. Only he and NBA Hall of Famer David Robinson have logged at least 1,000 points, 1,000 rebounds and 500 blocked shots in their NCAA careers. Varnado is the NCAA’s all-time leader with 564 rejections.