Without a second round pick in the 2016 NBA draft, its a good time to see what the Philadelphia 76ers have accomplished in that round. The NBA draft will be much plainer without Sam Hinkie’s magic in that second round
The second round of the NBA draft has been overlooked by many NBA teams in their team building strategy, often used in a “feel good” capacity to enhance and balance two sides of a potential NBA trade. Seldom given serious consideration of generating any impact players to an NBA roster, it had taken on the value of coins in the modern day NBA dealings focused on paper currency.
Except for one man, Philadelphia 76ers president and general manager Sam Hinkie. Much like coins that get dropped into a piggy bank, Sam Hinkie actually began to seek and accumulate second round draft picks from the NBA draft. In his previous three seasons of managing the team’s draft, Hinkie has selected in the second round a whopping twelve times. That also considers his first season with the Sixers, where his may arrival could do little to change the team’s draft position, and the team selected merely twice in second round in that season.
However, that first year became something of a circus. As national coverage nodded off in an almost automated coverage of a vanilla second round NBA draft, Sam Hinkie went to work. Performing in a manner that completely took the NBA and sport coverage by surprise, he added a rainbow of color and special effects to the monochrome events of that evening. He converted just two second round draft picks in 2013 into multiple selections and future draft picks. The reputation of general manager Sam Hinkie was born, and in one fell night he turned the status quo of the NBA into “I wonder what the Philadelphia 76ers general manager will do next?”.
Whereas the team started with just two draft picks, they certainly had more to show up with in the second round of the NBA draft on the following year, when Hinkie had amassed and exercised five selections in round two. The following year, the team repeated the process, once more selecting five prospects in the later round.
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So how did the team do? Well to arrive at that, we need to set the time machine back to the NBA draft nights of 2013, 2014, and 2015. We have the added insight of seeing how those draft picks turned out, which gives us a chance to decide for ourselves how effective the Sixers were in that second round.
Next: 2013