The Philadelphia 76ers have done a good job since the All-Star break ensuring that they will have a good shot at the first overall draft pick this season.
The Philadelphia 76ers are one of the many teams putting their sights on the top two draft prospects this season — Ben Simmons and Brandon Ingram. The hopes of pulling in one of those two players could, in theory, help pull your team out of a dark, dark place and give them the momentum needed to move into the successful realm of NBA teams. The art of purposefully losing games, or putting together rosters that will not be able to win games, is known as tanking, and general manager Sam Hinkie has seemingly mastered it over the past few seasons as the Sixers general manager. The only thing standing in his way has been the draft lottery, which prevents the worst overall team from automatically getting the first overall pick.
This leads to a very backwards view of what you want your team doing if you’re a fan of one of the teams in the bottom 5 or so of the NBA. Suddenly, a loss means just as much, if not more, than a win to you. Suddenly, you get concerned if your team wins 5 of 10 consecutive games. The Sixers were well on their way to being “too good” leading up to the All-Star break, winning 4 of their 12 games preceding the mid-season rest. Over these 12 games the Sixers scored over 100 points per game, shooting over 45 percent from the field and only turned the ball over about 16 times per game, which was much closer to the NBA average than they had been all the rest of this season. In the team’s first 40 games the Sixers turned the ball over nearly 18 times per game.
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Fans were getting a bit concerned. The Sixers, a team that was practically built to lose, was looking too good. But since the team has come back from the All-Star break, they’ve proven that they still have what it takes to out-tank any team in the NBA.
Tankathon is a website that glorifies this losing culture that so many NBA fans have embraced. To some, it’s disgusting. It highlights the Sixers 0-10 over the last 10 games green as if it’s a good thing and puts the Golden State Warriors 9-1 record in red as if it’s bad. It’s the backwards NBA, but many of us who have followed the Sixers and teams similar to the Sixers have grown to love it. While Tankathon seems to be just a satire site in the way I just described it, it’s actually a very helpful draft resource. It lets us see teams records and chances of getting a good draft pick that regular big-name websites don’t allow.
Philadelphia, as it stands right now, has a 25 percent chance — the largest in the league — to grab the number one overall pick, and a 64.3 percent chance — also the largest in the league — to land in the top 3. This has been climbing for them all season as they separate themselves from the rest of the losers by being the worst (or best) losers.
Although it was looking as if the Los Angeles Lakers would catch up to them and take over the worst record in the NBA — especially given each team’s trajectory heading into the All-Star break — the Sixers have held steady with the worst record, currently boasting one of 8-54 while the Lakers have a record of 13-51. The Lakers also beat the Warriors, who have the best record in the NBA, on Sunday afternoon, lowering their draft rankings. What’s important about the Lakers, is that the Sixers own their first round pick this year due to last year’s Michael Carter-Williams trade, but only if it ends up falling outside of the top 3.
Since the All-Star break, the Sixers have yet to win, and are actually playing some of the most ugly basketball I have ever seen. Given the level they were playing at just before the break, I was not one to predict that they would fall apart like this once the All-Star break ended, but they have. They are quickly solidifying their chances at the number one overall pick. You may like this because it helps their future, or you may find it disgraceful that the Sixers are playing at such a low level.
Although I do believe that Sam Hinkie has constructed rosters that are not built to win, I wouldn’t suggest that any of these players, or even coaches, don’t have a competitive spirit that wants to win basketball games. Guys like Jahlil Okafor, Nerlens Noel, and even Nik Stauskas, are generally used to succeeding especially when it comes to basketball. They aren’t going out there and playing bad basketball on purpose. They simply have been paired with other players that don’t fit well, and as a result, bad basketball occurs.
We can take what we get, though. The Sixers have been the worst team since the All-Star break, being the only team without a win so far, and allowing teams to score 117 points on them since their first game back from the break. They have played awful defense, and are only scoring 104 points of their own because teams are playing down to their level.
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It really seems as if this is by design, to get the team to secure that top overall draft pick. Whatever the cause of this sudden downfall, we can be thankful that it may lead to a brighter future for Philly.