The Sixer Sense
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Bryan Colangelo Needs Veterans, and That May Be a Good Thing

By Josh Wilson

Apr 8, 2016; Philadelphia, PA, USA; Philadelphia 76ers forward Elton Brand (42) prior to action against the New York Knicks at Wells Fargo Center. The New York Knicks won 109-102. Mandatory Credit: Bill Streicher-USA TODAY Sports
Apr 8, 2016; Philadelphia, PA, USA; Philadelphia 76ers forward Elton Brand (42) prior to action against the New York Knicks at Wells Fargo Center. The New York Knicks won 109-102. Mandatory Credit: Bill Streicher-USA TODAY Sports /
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Bryan Colangelo thinks the Philadelphia 76ers need veterans. That may be the difference between a winning and losing season.

The Philadelphia 76ers have been known for one common characteristic over the last three seasons. The team has seen many players come and go as they surfed along one of the most radical rebuilding processes the league has ever seen, but the one thing that remained the same was youth. Every roster that the Sixers put on the floor over the past few years has been quite youthful, and as a result, quite inexperienced.

Of course, there have been exceptions to the rule. Elton Brand and Carl Landry were here this year. Jason Richardson was here last year, and Thaddeus Young was here the year before. But looking down the “experience” column of most of the rosters of the last three years, there’s a whole lot of Rs, 1s, 2s, and 3s.

Sam Hinkie, the former president and general manager of the team, knowingly put these young, undeveloped rosters on the floor in the hopes that the team would lose. Losing leads to a better chance at the top overall draft pick, something the Sixers coveted throughout the past several seasons. The Sixers still have not obtained that top overall pick, but have a solid shot at it — in fact, the best shot out of all NBA teams — next Tuesday.

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Now, however, in going into the fourth regular season of the team’s rebuilding process, things need to start looking up. Just because Sam Hinkie has resigned and another face is leading the team does not mean that the rebuild clock starts over. Bryan Colangelo, the man who took Sam Hinkie’s place, needs to build on what Sam has given to him.

Hinkie has many assets that Bryan can use, and many of them are in the first round of this year’s draft. If the ping-pong balls fall in the right places, the Sixers could have a possible four first round picks to use to their advantage. At the very least, the Sixers will have three picks to make use of.

The first one (or two, depending on the positioning of the Lakers’ lottery outcome) picks in the draft will likely be used by the Sixers firsthand. The latter two may be used by the Sixers, but there is a potential that they will trade them for veteran players.

Bryan Colangelo was very outgoing with the media at the NBA Draft Combine — much more than Hinkie — and quite revealing about their draft strategy. Based on what he said to media, he may try to trade those picks away for veteran players.

Is this the right move? It’s certainly a deviation from the plan that Sam Hinkie put in place. But I believe this is one of the places where Sam was flawed in his rebuilding philosophy. Bryan is right. You can only have so many developing players on one team. With Jahlil Okafor, Nerlens Noel, and Joel Embiid still very much in young developmental stages of their career, adding on four rookies to that could be disastrous. The team wouldn’t know how to handle losses, and if by some miracle that team made the playoffs, they would fall apart due to a lack of veteran knowledge.

Although adding vets may be smart, trading away a top five overall pick to obtain a middle-level veteran player would not be wise.

Most successful teams have a few solid “old heads” on their team and then several solid players that have been in the league longer than five years. Looking at the team’s remaining in this year’s playoffs, they are certainly not stocked with many developing players. One of the only exceptions to that is the outstanding play of Josh Richardson with the Miami Heat, which not many people saw coming. Richardson was passed on until the second round of last year’s draft.

Even looking at more than just successful teams, rebuilding teams can benefit from veteran presences as well. Elton Brand did a lot for the young guys on this team, and Kevin Garnett had a lot of value in Karl-Anthony Towns’s rookie season with the Minnesota Timberwolves.

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I’m open to going after a few solid veteran players instead of using those later two draft picks. I think most Sixers fans feel the same. As long as Bryan doesn’t do something like trade away a top-three draft pick, Sixers fans won’t riot.