Philadelphia 76ers: 5 Starting Lineup Options

With Ben Simmons being the only certain entity in the Philadelphia 76ers’ starting lineup this upcoming season, there are a plethora of options work considering.

This season will mark the beginning of a new era for Philadelphia 76ers basketball, as they officially retire “the process” and beginning implementing the beginning of Bryan Colangelo’s expedited rebuild.

With a set of young players making their rookie debuts this year in Ben Simmons, Joel Embiid, Dario Saric, and Timothe Luwawu-Cabarrot, the Sixers’ potential versatility in terms of rotations has already taken a massive leap. In addition, the new free agency signings only increase the number of options Brett Brown will have when drawing up the lineups he’ll utilize most in this upcoming campaign.

The Sixers have finally moved past static asset collection and are beginning to make legitimate improvements with the roster and around the organization. They’ve brought in veteran voices such as Gerald Henderson and Jerryd Bayless to provide steady hands on the perimeter, while also reaching into international waters to add Sergio Rodriguez to the fold at the point. Colangelo is striving to make increimental improvements as much as possible while the Sixers wait for their chance to make a major splash in free agency, and has done a solid job in doing so thus far.

Ben Simmons will obviously be the head of any rotation Brett Brown throws onto the court next season, but the other pieces around him seem far less from certain. The Sixers’ glut of big men in the post complicate matters quite a bit in terms of how they want to construct their frontcourt pecking order, while the new veterans will likely need to prove their worthiness over some of the younger pieces that Sixers could still use down the road, and vice versa.

The positional flexibility the Sixers now have opens up avenues for production in a number of manners. They have the pieces needed to run small ball and push the pace when needed, while also having ample size to put out a lineup that can overpower the opposition from a physical standpoint. Small ball likely wouldn’t work as the main rotation, and so-called big ball wouldn’t be the most functional everyday fall back, but a balance of the two opposing sides could provide a nice grouping to start off each game.

It’ll be a feeling out process of sorts as Brown gets used to the new pieces he has been given and the direction the franchise is now attempting to go. There’s a good chance we will see a number of different rotations tested early on, with a multitude of principles behind them.

Next: Lineup No. 1