Karma has been a vicious mistress to the Philadelphia 76ers. But in strange twist, might now be steering Markelle Fultz to the team
On one hand, you have University of Washington point guard Markelle Fultz. He is the consensus number one pick in the 2017 NBA Draft. He has it all, does it all. He’s the one man wrecking crew of the University of Washington Huskies basketball team that has been losing games. In fact, the team had lost the last twelve games of the season, one of which included the face off between UCLA’s Lonzo Ball and Fultz.
UCLA won that game.
But other forces are at work as well. Markelle Fultz had missed five of the last seven games of the Huskies season. The reason? He has an unspecified knee injury. And that’s raised more than one set of eyebrows. Christian Caple addressed those very concerns in an article written for TheOlympian.com. In the article, he discussed Fultz’s injury with University of Washington head coach Lorenzo Romar. As of right now, Romar places Fultz as unlikely to appear in the PAC-12 men’s basketball tournament. UW faces USC at 8:30 PM Wednesday, March 8.
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Markelle’s Knee
Caple did persuade Romar to reveal a little bit more about the knee:
"“They know exactly what they feel is supposed to happen or what may not happen in a certain amount of time,” Romar said. “Like we had said before, he came back and didn’t quite respond the way they wanted, so we just backed off a little longer.” Asked if Fultz’s knee has any structural damage, Romar replied: “Just for Markelle and everybody else, that’s all I’m going to say on it. The less you say, the more it raises, ‘well, what’s going on? I know they’re hiding something.’ Nobody’s hiding anything. He’s just not ready to go yet, until we find out (in) this meeting (with doctors).” – per Christian Caple of TheOlympian.com"
What do we know? We know it’s a knee. We know that it is not a major injury, We can infer that it is soft tissue: cartilage, ligament, tendons. Since the physicians tried Fultz out on the knee after some rest and then rested him again, the injury is most likely associated with the meniscus.
Meniscus, Markelle?
Philadelphia fans know about that injury site. And it explains why the hesitancy to discuss. The spectrum of recovery on a meniscus tear can be rather quick or somewhat prolonged. It depends on the severity, the athlete, the medical care, and the entire host of factors promoting healing.
Air Alamo
There is no medical chart, no direct physician statement, nor any confirmation from player nor coach of what the medical issue is. But Markelle Fultz is walking but not playing. He is under physician’s care but is not scheduled for surgery. One of the most common knee injuries is a Meniscus tear per Orthoinfor.aaos.org. As such, his treatment plan will likely involve several options, depending on the way his body responds.
Right now, the best thing for the knee is the RICE Protocol.
The RICE protocol is ordered for most sports-related injuries. RICE is an an acronym which means Rest, Ice, Compression, and Elevation.
RICE
Rest. Take a break from the activity that caused the injury. Your doctor may recommend that you use crutches to avoid putting weight on your leg. Ice. Use cold packs for 20 minutes at a time, several times a day. Do not apply ice directly to the skin. Compression. To prevent additional swelling and blood loss, wear an elastic compression bandage. Elevation. To reduce swelling, recline when you rest, and put your leg up higher than your heart. In the event of swelling, aspirin or ibuprofen to help reduce pain and swelling.
Regardless of actual injury, the fact of Markelle Fultz missing five of the last seven games, and possibly the PAC-12 tournament, will blemish his outstanding freshman season. While he rehabs, other NBA prospects will compete in their respective NCAA conference tournaments. Finally, 64 NCAA teams will participate in the NCAA National Tournament – March Madness.
Philadelphia 76ers Draft Position
8 Points, 9 Seconds
In one simple statement, the Philadelphia 76ers 2017 NBA Draft situations benefits by the team losing, Kings losing, and Lakers winning. While there is plenty more to that draft than the first round, Markelle Fultz is a top prospect. He will not survive past the fifth pick of the NBA Draft.
But he may not need to. The best odds of any team in the 2017 NBA Draft for the top overall pick is that of the Brooklyn Nets, whose draft probability is 25 percent. But the Brooklyn Nets owe their number one pick to the Boston Celtics.
Meanwhile, at the 26th ranked team, the Philadelphia 76ers have a mere 8.8 percent chance at the number one pick.
The lottery determines the order of the 2017 NBA Draft.
NBA DRAFT PROBABILITY TABLE
| Seed | Chances | 1st | 2nd | 3rd | 4th | 5th | 6th | 7th | 8th | 9th | 10th | 11th | 12th | 13th | 14th |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 - 3oth place | 250 | 25.0% | 21.5% | 17.8% | 35.7% | ||||||||||
| 2- 29th place | 199 | 19.9% | 18.8% | 17.1% | 31.9% | 12.3% | |||||||||
| 3- 28th place | 156 | 15.6% | 15.7% | 15.6% | 22.6% | 26.5% | 4.0% | ||||||||
| 4 - 27th place | 119 | 11.9% | 12.6% | 13.3% | 9.9% | 35.1% | 16.0% | 1.2% | |||||||
| 5- 26th place | 088 | 8.8% | 9.7% | 10.7% | 26.1% | 36.0% | 8.4% | .4% | |||||||
| 6- 25th place | 063 | 6.3% | 7.1% | 8.1% | 43.9% | 30.5% | 4% | .1% | |||||||
| 7- 24th place | 043 | 4.3% | 4.9% | 5.8% | 59.9% | 23.2% | 1.8% | 0.0% | |||||||
| 8- 23rd place | 028 | 2.8% | 3.3% | 3.9% | 72.4% | 16.8% | .8% | 0.0% | |||||||
| 9- 22nd place | 017 | 1.7% | 2.0% | 2.4% | 81.3% | 12.2% | .4% | 0.0% | |||||||
| 10-21st place | 011 | 1.1% | 1.3% | 1.6% | 87.0% | 8.9% | .2% | 0.0% | |||||||
| 11-20th place | 008 | .8% | .9% | 1.2% | 90.7% | 6.3% | .1% | 0.0% | |||||||
| 12-19th place | 007 | .7% | .8% | 1.0% | 93.5% | 3.9% | 0.0% | ||||||||
| 13-18th place | 006 | .6% | .7% | .9% | 96.0% | 1.8% | |||||||||
| 14-17th place | 005 | .5% | .6% | .7% | 98.2% | ||||||||||
| 15-16th place or below | 0 | 0.0% | 0.0% | 0.0% | 0.0% | 0.0% | 0.0% | 0.0% | 0.0% | 0.0% | 0.0% | 0.0% | 0.0% | 0.0% | 0.0% |
If that were all the Philadelphia 76ers had going for them, this would be a bleak snowball’s-chance-in-hell-morale-to-the-story. But you know I would not take you there.
Hinkie Compounded Chances
The Philadelphia have two other paths to Markelle Fultz as well. First, let’s summarize their probability of the top three picks as of March 7, 2017.
As 26th ranked, the Philadelphia 76ers have an 8.8 percent chance of the top pick, a 9.7 percent chance at the second pick, and a 10.7 percent chance at the third overall pick. As a group, the 76ers have a 29.2 percent chance for a top-three pick with the team’s current rank.
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But those wonderful Sacramento Kings are part of that formula now, and they are not winning. As of March 7, 2017, they add an additional 4.3 percent to the odds for a first overall pick, 4.9 percent to the odds of picking second, and 5.8 percent to the odds of picking third. The Sacramento Kings are in a five game losing streak, and will likely lose a few more games before season’s end. at 25-38, the Kings have 19 games remaining to play. A majority of those games are versus playoff bound teams.
Meanwhile, the Los Angeles Lakers are currently in a seven game losing streak. If the team does no better than 29th place in the NBA, the Philadelphia 76ers will still have nearly even odds of getting a second pick in the first round of the 2017 NBA Draft. The 76ers would enjoy a 31.9 percent chance of getting the Lakers pick at number four, and a 12.3 percent chance of collecting a first round pick at number five.
What does this all mean? The 76ers chances of getting a top five pick in the 2017 NBA Draft are relatively good and improving. But will it be enough to get Fultz?
Convergence
The Paths of Markelle Fultz are heading in opposite directions. Due to the Philadelphia 76ers earlier success, the current losing streak of the Philadelphia 76ers and Sacramento Kings is improving the teams likelihood of picking early in that 2017 NBA Draft.
Similarly, the health of Markelle Fultz right now is a flag. On top of that is the fact that this is a strong draft class, and many players near the value of Markelle Fultz will participate in the NCAA tournament.
Other players can gain momentum, perhaps even to the point of overcoming Fultz. It happens every year. Right now, the talk is all about UCLA’s Lonzo Ball. He has a great team supporting his play. So does Josh Jackson.
With Markelle Fultz 'Unlikely' to Play in Postseason, Lonzo Ball, Josh Jackson Could Overtake Him for No. 1 Pick https://t.co/WYaTB9iF3Q
— Adam Zagoria (@AdamZagoria) March 4, 2017
In the end, scouts want to see how top players perform against top competition. Markelle Fultz, a freshman, will not have that box checked on his scouting report. And that will suit the Philadelphia 76ers just fine. The 76ers have a specific niche, a niche that Markelle Fultz fills completely.
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After all the bad luck, odd lottery results, and unfortunate outcomes, Lady Luck owes the Philadelphia 76ers something very positive. Perhaps Karma is trying to make amends this year.
It’s about time.