Constant Change of “The Process” Has Slowed Philadelphia 76ers Rebuilding
By Josh Wilson
The Philadelphia 76ers rebuilding process has been constantly changing and it may be slowing down their “master plan.”
Throughout the past few seasons, Sam Hinkie’s master plan of tearing down a team in hopes of rebuilding with cash and stashed draft picks has been highly criticized by fans, analysts, and writers. As the years go on, his madness seems to be less questioned, and Hinkie seems to have more supporters each season, despite the constant losing.
This season, with bringing in Jahlil Okafor, a top-tier rookie and incredible scorer, along with having a possible four picks in the first round alone of this year’s NBA Draft, the plan seemed to be approaching the point where the scales start to tip in the Sixers’ favor. But some, including myself, are skeptical that the plan will pay off as soon as some of the most intense process trusters think it will.
The main issue with me is that it seems like the plan has never been completely solid. I haven’t been anywhere behind closed doors with Hinkie to know what the plan was supposed to be all along, but it feels as if he’s making stuff up along as he goes. Some of the moves, I’ve agreed with, but others seem quick and rash, and show a clear over-zealousness with draft picks.
Change has set the team back, and change, in conjunction with that over-zealousness of draft picks on Hinkie’s part, have hurt the team. Last year at the trade deadline Hinkie traded Michael Carter-Williams to the Milwaukee Bucks and got a Lakers first round draft pick in return. The Lakers pick was for 2015, but was top-5 protected. Their pick ended up being number 2 overall, so they got to keep it. It is top-3 protected this season, and it looks like they may keep it yet again. No one predicted the Lakers being this bad with Kobe Bryant returning and Russell’s debut. But did Hinkie? I doubt he saw it coming either. Instead of having that draft pick available this season, he may have to wait one, or even two more seasons to use it, which was certainly a big change.
The plan seems to be changing all the time, but it’s not all Sam Hinkie’s fault. Things out of his control have changed the plan around and how things have been approached have been completely variable, and that’s not something Hinkie can control. The curiousity is whether or not Hinkie accounted for those variabilities, such as the Lakers pick likely falling under their protection this season.
On top of that, at the beginning of this season, the Sixers seemed slated to draft D’Angelo Russell to fill their void at the point guard spot. Instead, Russell went 2nd overall, just one pick before the Sixers to the Los Angeles Lakers. Hinkie had to call an audible and draft Jahlil Okafor, a center. The Sixers already had a promising Nerlens Noel at center and Joel Embiid hopefully coming back within the next few seasons.
Quite possibly the biggest change regarding the rebuilding process this season was bringing in Jerry Colangelo as Vice President of basketball operations. Colangelo is an experienced basketball mind, but one that typically we would have thought would butt heads with Hinkie’s way of thinking, and he probably has.
Colangelo has been adamant that the Sixers will make no moves at the trade deadline this year, but will instead be looking to build with signings in the offseason. This is definitely off-course for what Hinkie would have wanted, as he was usually looking towards the draft and trade deadline. At some point, of course, free agency would have had to come into play, but it wasn’t clear when that was going to be.
In a way, we may never know whether or not Hinkie’s original plan would have paid off because of all the changes that have slowed it down. But that should all be a part of the plan, figuring out what can change and working around it. I’m not completely confident thinking that Hinkie could have gotten the job done with all the changes that came towards the team.
All in all, we have to wonder, do the changes ultimately set the team back? The Lakers pick not coming the Sixers way probably slows them down a bit, and a complete change of plan in bringing in Colangelo probably hurt Hinkie’s momentum as well. I think it’s safe to say that the several changes that have occurred during the rebuilding process have slowed the team’s rebuilding down.
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I’m confident in saying that the changes set the team back, I’m just not sure by how much. While some see next season as the year the Sixers finally rise towards playoff competitiveness, I don’t think that will be the case at all.