Coming into the 2019-20 NBA season, few teams had better odds at lifting the Larry O’Brien trophy than the Philadelphia 76ers. The team reminded everyone why that was the case during its Christmas Day showdown with the Milwaukee Bucks. Despite entering in fifth place and 5.5 games behind their opponents on the day, Philly throttled Milwaukee en route to a 121-109 final that wasn’t as close as the scoreline indicated.
Philly is good, and they certainly have been dealt a difficult hand due to injuries and scheduled rest among their starting five, but despite the win on Wednesday, there’s a sense that the team should be better (or at the very least, more consistent). There’s a path for the Sixers to get there, though, and while these holiday wishlist items aren’t everything, they’d be three huge steps forward for Philly’s hopes of winning a ring.
#1: Answers At Point Guard
The Sixers have Ben Simmons running the show, but his non-shooting makes it kind of hard to trust him to orchestrate the offense at times. Is he a point guard who can lead the team to a championship this year, or is he more of a secondary playmaker who does other offensive things that 6’10 guys are supposed to do? If the answer is B, can the team give more minutes to someone on the roster (Raul Neto? Trey Burke?), or do they need to be players on the trade/buyout market to find upgrades to their lead guard depth? If the answer is A, can the team figure out a way to make things work so that when opponents dare Simmons to beat them from the perimeter, they can make things happen?
Fortunately for Philly, Simmons is good enough that this shouldn’t be too tough to figure out, they’ve still had success with him on the floor this season, and his good games are quite good. They’re in a tricky situation, though, as the team has title-or-bust aspirations and needs to foresee what happens when they run into the Bucks or someone out west. If they determine they need someone other than him to have the ball in their hands with games on the line, a la Jimmy Butler last postseason, Elton Brand has a hectic few weeks ahead of him.
#2: Floor Spacing To Close Games
Regardless of the Simmons question, it’s evident that the Sixers sometimes really miss having a guy like J.J. Redick who can be a consistent threat from deep. The team’s most-used lineup (per Cleaning the Glass) and the one that will presumably close big games features Simmons, Josh Richardson, Tobias Harris, Al Horford, and Joel Embiid. Simmons is a reluctant shooter, while the remaining four dudes, respectively, connect on triples at the following rates: 34.9 percent, 34.7 percent, 34.5 percent, and 33 percent. Those are, among regular contributors, the four worst three point field goal percentages on the team.
They’re not quite as good as their absolutely lights-out performance against Milwaukee — those four dudes shot a combined 15-for-31 against the Bucks — but all four of them, Harris especially, are better shooters than those percentages. If they don’t quite find that, the Sixers might be wise to do one of two things: Find more minutes for some guys currently on the roster who have proven to be consistently more dangerous from deep, or be super active on the trade/buyout market, which they did a few years back when they acquired Marco Belinelli and Ersan Ilyasova.
While the team is actually fifth in the league in three point field goal percentage, they’re 26th in attempts per game and have not gotten consistent shooting from their starting five. That has to improve.
#3: Joel Embiid To Always Be Joel Embiid
It’s rare that a player gets called out by Shaquille O’Neal and Charles Barkley for not asserting themselves more, then admits they were correct to do this before going out and having a big game. That happened with Embiid earlier this year, one in which he’s looked like a star who’s not quite at the level we all know he’s capable.
The primary things with Embiid are, always, that he’ll stay healthy and that he can come up big when the lights shine the brightest. Those are questions that matter way more in April, May, and if they’re lucky, June than they do in December. Having said that, getting to see the best version of Embiid consistently — the one who has the talent to be mentioned among the best basketball players in the world, the one who dominated the Bucks on both ends of the floor on Christmas — is something that every Sixers fan would certainly love to see.
