Philly moves on from Hinkie’s departure
PHILADELPHIA >> Sam Hinkie quit on The Process.
The Philadelphia 76ers threw a pizza party.
No, the two events were not related, though it was a bit peculiar to find the team’s practice facility festooned with balloons as select season-ticket holders gorged on food a day after perhaps the most bizarre departure in 76ers history.
With Franklin, the blue dog mascot, waving from a window, the Sixers wound down practice with Drake’s “Energy” blaring through the court.
“I got enemies, got a lotta enemies / Got a lotta people tryna drain me of my energy.”
Might as well have been Hinkie’s theme song.
The Sixers are moving ahead in their painful rebuild without the general manager who methodically turned the organization into one of the worst in professional sports.
The new era comes a day after Hinkie informed the team via a 13page manifesto littered with references to Abraham Lincoln and flightless birds that he was out.
Coach Brett Brown was again left holding the bag as Hinkie scrammed out of town.
“He obviously felt like this was not something he wanted to be a part of,” Brown said Thursday. “He didn’t want to be a part of the collaborative effort.”
Brown decided to stick out this elongated rebuild and was rewarded — rewarded? — earlier this season with a contract extension. Hinkie was hired by owner Josh Harris in 2013 to find a creative way to turn the Sixers into winners. Hinkie’s plan — gut the roster of any solid NBA talent, shred payroll and stockpile draft picks to build for the future — had the initial backing of ownership.
The 76ers went 19-63 on his watch in his first season and 18-64 last season.
Year 3 has been even worse even by those miserable standards.
The Sixers started 1-30 and Harris had been embarrassed enough. Hinkie’s power was weakened in December when the Sixers hired Jerry Colangelo to oversee basketball operations. Hinkie ran an analytics-minded front office and when the Sixers wanted to add more basketball people, he balked.
Hinkie was pushed and became more defiant, insisting he didn’t help and that his sour relationship with agents would improve once he started throwing cash at free agents — which the Sixers are finally poised to do this summer.
Hinkie did not share in Philadelphia’s vision of having him adjust or add to the power structure, so he quit.
Following Hinkie’s departure, the 76ers looked to the family tree for a replacement — Bryan Colangelo had long been mentioned as having a future role in the organization after stints in Phoenix and Toronto.
The Sixers are set to hire the former NBA executive of the year as their general manager, according to a person with knowledge of the decision. The person spoke on condition of anonymity because Colangelo’s hiring was not official.