Philadelphia 76ers Are Limping To Season’s Finish Line

As the NBA season began, the Philadelphia 76ers started with numerous injuries to team. Now as season draws to a close, the team is once more limping along

On Friday, March 11, 2016, the Philadelphia 76ers lost four players. Earlier in the day, the team announced that rookie center/power forward Jahlil Okafor would have season ending surgery to repair a torn meniscus in his knee. With a six-week recovery, and a five-week season, that announcement indirectly indicated that Okafor would no longer play for the remainder of the NBA season. He joins teammate and good friend Joel Embiid — who has been recovering from a foot injury for the past two seasons — on the sidelines. Later, in the third quarter of the game against the Brooklyn Nets, Jerami Grant fell head over heels, and his foot came into full contact with the head of Robert Covington. Both players would leave the game after several minutes of being tended to by team trainers.

Jerami Grant was evaluated for a concussion due to the severe impact of his head against the hardwood floor, while Robert Covington was transported via stretcher and in a neck brace to Jefferson Hospital to be evaluated for a neck injury.

The injuries could not have happened at a worse time for the team.   With a season closing out and the team facing difficult decisions immediately upon the onset of the end of the regular season, each player is tasked with putting on their best performances to help the team make the right decision about the team’s, and the player’s futures. But that effort was temporarily place on hold by the events of the Friday night victory over the Brooklyn Nets.

Robert Covington, Richaun Holmes, and Jerami Grant joined Joel Embiid and Jahlil Okafor in the ranks of the injured.  While there is no question marks over the viability of either Okafor nor Embiid making the team next season, the “Sword of Diomedes” hangs over the heads of Covington, Holmes, and Grant.  Each player offers enough to warrant consideration, none has locked down an airtight case to make the team.   And so, the news from yesterday was particularly damning for the three young hopefuls.

The off-season move to hire one of the world’s leading authorities in the fledgling field of sports science and medicine, Dr. David T. Martin, continues to pay huge dividends for this team.   While his knowledge base gives the players some of the best chances to remain healthy, he also is directly involved in their full recovery when injuries do happen.  Yesterday, he discovered that his hand held a full house:

Meanwhile, later in the quarter, Richaun Holmes strained his Achilles heel and was also forced to leave the game.

With so many injured now, the team is forced into playing a much smaller active roster than hoped for to close out the season. The venerable Elton Brand, who was brought to the team to act as a mentor and guide to the team’s young big players, particularly for fellow Duke Alumnus Okafor, was forced into action for the third time this season, playing 6 minutes at the close of Friday’s victory over the Brooklyn Nets, where he brought down 2 rebounds and had 1 block.  But an even larger impact from a veteran forward was that of Carl Landry, who jumped into the game as his teammates’ injuries were being tended to and gave 25 quality minutes, leading the team with 16 point on nearly 78 percent shooting from the floor.

The Sixers must now somehow regroup to face the Detroit Pistons, who are chasing down the last playoff spot with the thinnest of margins over the Chicago Bulls.  Their lead for post-season is a mere one-half game, and the Pistons must be salivating to find the Sixers, now badly wounded, as their next opponent on the schedule. But the Pistons are not hot by any means. Despite the playoff crunch run, they are finishing up a four game road trip, currently at one win one loss, and have only mustered a two win three loss record so far in March 2016.

Without Covington or Okafor, hopefully the team will see the debut of recently signed shooting guard Sonny Weems alongside seldom used Carl Landry and Elton Brand tonight.  While the Sixers had long been eliminated from post season, the team is still full of talented players who are all fighting for a roster spot on the team next year, as well as putting up quality film to entice other teams to offer them an opportunity if they fail to make the Sixers roster.

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Robert Covington, now out of the woods of a feared neck injury, will not have the immediate opportunity to do so.  While he has been touted this season as one of the teams few two-way players, his up and down performances have left many, even head coach Brett Brown, puzzled at times.  But when he turns it on, and he has shown that on many occasions, he can dominate the game of basketball in a way that few current players can.  The hope is for his return to full health quickly, not only to rejoin his team to close out this season, but to set a standard of consistent play that will carry over into next year.

Some say that first impressions make lasting impressions, but final impression tend to linger.   As the Philadelphia 76ers battle inexperience, injury, and the remaining NBA teams on their diminishing schedule, they are fighting for more than pride.   Don’t expect the team to simply roll over and play dead, they won’t.   As last night’s ninth victory for the team proved  beyond a shadow of a doubt, this team will fight with each and every player for a victory.

Next: Do We Need to Start Holding Brett Brown More Accountable?

With so many questions about the team in 2016 likely remaining unanswered until weeks after the 2016 NBA draft, each player currently on the team has a chance to remain with the team with a great end to a bumps-in-the-road type of season.  Center Nerlens Noel can demonstrate his sophomore skills at center.  Hollis Thompson can put on a long range clinic.  T.J. McConnell can show the team that he can be more than a backup point guard.  Even veteran Carl Landry, seldom called into action, can show the powers-that-be that his state of perpetual preparedness is vital to the team as it fights to advance into the win column next year.  Even if the team is bringing in new faces to starting roles next year, there will be plenty of opportunity for quality minutes on this team from the bench.

There is much more basketball to enjoy with this team, despite the plethora of injuries. Let’s see who wants to play for the Sixers in the 2016-2017 badly enough.