The Philadelphia 76ers have finally added a third superstar to the dynamic duo of Joel Embiid and Ben Simmons. Jimmy Butler official became a Sixer on Monday afternoon, as the trade that was announced over the weekend became official. On Tuesday, the team held an introductory press conference for the four-time All-Star selection.
Of course, if all worked out right, Philadelphia wouldn’t have needed to trade for a third star, because the team’s hope was that Markelle Fultz would have developed into that guy. But for a myriad of reasons, Fultz hasn’t gotten there, with the latest chapter coming when he shot the most bizarre free throw of the 2018-19 season against the Miami Heat on Monday night.
Fultz had a rough night on the whole, scoring five points on 2-for-8 shooting in 25 minutes. After the game, Sixers coach Brett Brown spoke to Tim Bontemps of ESPN about how hard it is to handle this situation.
“It is [difficult],” Brown said. “Because you’ve got a human side, and a responsibility to the individual, but mostly you’ve got a responsibility to the team, and somewhere in that pyramid of layers I’ve got to figure it out.
“There’s no book that tells you how to do that,” Brown continued. “I use my gut feel and best judgement and just keep it very candid. When I feel something, or see something, and you can convey it to you, or the team, or whatever, that’s when I feel comfortable.”
Brown legitimately sounds like he wants to help Fultz, not because he’s a coach and Fultz plays for him, but because he just wants to see a young man reach his potential. At the same time, though, he knows that can only go so far, because the main responsibility of his job is to win basketball games.
It’s an awfully tough situation to be in, especially now that expectations will increase considerably with Butler around. We’ve made the case that Philadelphia should probably look to move Fultz, but based on Brown’s comments, it sounds like the team wants to do whatever it can to help him out before getting to that point.
(Via ESPN)
