Philadelphia 76ers: It’s Time For Front Court Bench To Step Up

The Philadelphia 76ers season, despite an unfortunate 0-5 start, has been full of pleasant surprises. Jahlil Okafor is doing better than anyone expected, averaging nearly 20 points per game. T.J. McConnell is a player no one predicted playing this well. Isaiah Canaan even started to hit his groove coming off of the bench on Saturday against the Orlando Magic.

Despite all of these positive efforts, there’s so much missing, and that’s why the team still has yet to win a game. Yes, there are injuries, and yes, the Sixers will be better once they are back to full health, but there’s some fixing to do with players that are at full health now, and that shouldn’t have an excuse for poor play.

The Sixers have one of the strongest starting front courts in the NBA. Nerlens Noel has established himself as a solid defensive player with his 1.9 blocks per game last year, and is clearly looking to capitalize on that this season. Jahlil Okafor is blowing other rookie of the year candidates out of the water with his dominance in the paint and high scoring.

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They’ve done so well that some have forgotten there was even a front court bench. Heck, the Sixers as a team might have forgotten that there’s a front court bench. They’re definitely not playing like they want to be remembered.

Christian Wood has hardly gotten any time on the floor. He’s only played 17 total minutes, but still, has failed to do a ton with those. Per 36 minutes he is averaging 16.9 points and 4.2 rebounds. Per game, his production is nearly negligible, averaging 1.6 points and 0.4 rebounds. Wood needs more minutes if he’s going to get used to NBA gameplay.

On Monday night, due to an absent Nerlens Noel, Wood got more minutes, and did decently. He scored nine points and brought in eight rebounds.

A lot of the same can be said for Richaun Holmes. Holmes had his first NBA start Monday night against the Chicago Bulls, and it went decently, but not great. He scored 11 points. He’s averaging just 4.2 points per game and 2.2 rebounds.

Despite them both showing us more on Monday night against the Bulls, they had their mistakes. Not recognizing the shot clock was running out, taking bad shots, and missing easy shots.

The idea here is clear: they need more minutes. Still, it’s tough, because they sit behind one of the best front courts in the NBA that is still trying to figure out things for themselves.

Still, it shows us what the biggest loss so far of this season has been.

In retrospect, this failure for any backup players to step up and really do anything significant in support of Okafor and Noel, we finally see what the worst cut of training camp was–Furkan Aldemir. Although it was initially reported to have been thought that the team was going to sign him with their hardship clause, he was already gone, and in conversations with a basketball club in his home country of Turkey.

Aldemir wasn’t fantastic last year, only scoring 2.3 points per game. Still, he seemingly would have been a much better option than Wood or Holmes, at least at this point in the season.

This isn’t a position that’s going to get better with players returning from injury. No one from the front court is injured. We can only hope that Holmes and Wood wake up. It might take some more confidence spilled on them from Brett Brown with more minutes, but something has to be done.

Next: Game Recap: Bulls vs. Sixers

How can they get better? They need to be trusted. Brett Brown put trust in T.J. McConnell, gave him more minutes, and it went well. The same has to be done for Holmes and Wood. They need minutes to succeed.