The Philadelphia 76ers rebuilding process is still underway. But the NBA constructed barriers for the 2019 NBA Draft and beyond to prevent replication.
Tanking. Philadelphia 76ers. Sam Hinkie. Rebuild. One of these things do not belong. If you ask most of the Philadelphia 76ers fans, they will point to the term “tanking” as the outlier. If you ask fans of any other NBA team, there will be quite a bit of confusion. You see, the perspective from around the league is that the team tanked. Deliberately tried to lose to get a high draft pick. But nothing could be further from the truth.
The reason for this is simply the priorities of the Philadelphia 76ers were less about “win now” than about “win it all”. And for some national-media-driven-conclusion, that means the team tried purposefully to lose. The actuality is that the history of this team was about winning, but identifying the players who could help them do so as quickly as possible.
Trust The Process meant patience for the rebuild
If you examine what “Trust The Process” actually stood for, it had nothing to do with losing. It was a rallying cry to fans to show patience as the team sorted through the young and inexperienced players in the search for NBA caliber talent. If the Philadelphia 76ers truly stood for losing, they didn’t do a very good job of it in the long haul.
The team drafted third two seasons in a row. Compare that to the Los Angeles Lakers picking second three consecutive season, despite having a much better record. In 2014, the 76ers were 19-63 to the Lakers 27-55. And again, in 2015 the 76ers were 18-64 to the Lakers 21-61. In 2016, the 76ers fell to 10-72 to the Lakers 17-65. While the Philadelphia 76ers did score the top pick in that 2016 NBA Draft, they had already jettisoned the services of team executive Sam Hinkie.
Hinkie never selected higher than third in an NBA Draft. But he did plenty of selecting in the second round.
Philadelphia 76ers patiently found NBA talent
No other team in the NBA rummaged through the second round of the NBA Draft like the Philadelphia 76ers. And while the Sixers did so, they signed undrafted players to audition them on the NBA basketball court. After all, how else do players like Richaun Holmes, Jerami Grant, Robert Covington, or T.J. McConnell get a chance to play in the NBA.
There are three areas a team must have patience, and the Philadelphia 76ers organization, as a whole, displayed that patience in all areas. First, a team with no assets must display great patience amassing the salary cap and draft picks needed to conduct a true team rebuild. Secondly the organization must show great patience as the NBA team cycles through large numbers of players/prospects as they search for players who have “it”. That “it” is a niche role in a championship team. Finally, the organization must have incredible patience with young players as they develop, mature, and improve to NBA caliber play.
Why try to find role players?
But the ultimate question is … Why? Why work so hard to find role players? Well, the recent free agency spend-fest for the Philadelphia 76ers shows why. Shooting guard J.J. Redick commanded a $23 Million contract from the Philadelphia 76ers. Power Forward Amir Johnson commanded $11 Million. In the Philadelphia 76ers roster, they are two of the three most expensive players currently on the team. What about the other three? Well, Robert Covington is the third “most expensive” player. But both McConnell and Holmes play for $1.4 Million per year for the next two seasons. To win at championship level, teams need to find undervalued players and ride their production. The fourth player, Jerami Grant, earns $1.5 Million for the Oklahoma City Thunder.
Rebuilding rules changed
And three of the four still play for the 76ers. In fact, they continue to play on a team which is still improving. But if the rebuild “worked” and if the players who were signed panned out, why is there no risk of some other team merely following suit?
Well to start off, some teams do not believe that the rebuild has worked at all. Some point to the injury prone Philadelphia 76ers roster, the sub-.500 record, and rationalize that this team is not good at all. Others look at the roster as unfinished, and simply play the “jury is still out” rationalization.
You can build for tomorrow, but you won’t get to enjoy it
The biggest roadblock to any team electing a longer term view to rebuild springs from the outcome of Sam Hinkie with the Philadelphia 76ers. Doing the right thing for a team’s long term future is a sure-fire way of not being in charge when that long term future arrives. Owners want profits. Profits means revenue. Revenue means fan support. The cost of looking ahead means nobody focuses on today. Ticket sales and merchandising tumbles means somebody gets fired.
Still, even if a team wanted to walk the trail blazed by the Philadelphia 76ers organization, there are significant hurdles in their way. Let’s look at three significant detriments for some modern NBA team to entrust their future to “The Process”:
Reason I – NBA team are impatient despite creating a system requiring patience
Let’s face it. No NBA team can succeed by building through the NBA Draft instantly. As much as fans fear the NBA Draft giving too much clout to an opposing team, it takes an NBA player several years to approach their ceiling on the basketball court. The odds of hitting a top draft pick as the worst NBA team was no better than 25 percent. That means that the worst team in the NBA has a 75 percent chance of selecting second or lower.
NBA rookies are no certainty. If you look back to any NBA Draft, stars can emerge from anywhere in round one. The secret to success in an NBA Draft is patience. Young players can succeed if you do not ask too much of them. The Philadelphia 76ers, entering the NBA Draft with a long term view, accepted the greater risk inherent with choosing an injured player in the NBA Draft. Nerlens Noel needed a year to heal. Joel Embiid required two years. Investing that much into a player who won’t produce for the team immediately is gutsy. Few teams are willing to do so. And those are just the players with injury.
Fit and upside is guesswork
So many fans believe the NBA Draft is a science. It’s not. Of the first ten players selected in the 2015 NBA Draft, two are playing with new teams. Many are filling a role off the bench. A majority have yet to average more than ten points a game. So the entire argument about NBA teams need to scout better takes a dive.
Scouting is only part of the equation. Fit is another. Upside is still another. A great post player with limited speed will hinder a team focusing on pace, space, and passing. He may be adept at scoring 30 points a game, but he simply does not fit the team’s focus. So too that a player who dominates at the college level has to prove himself in the pros. So the general manager who selects top draft picks in the NBA will likely not be around to enjoy their emergence as an NBA star – even if that comes to pass. More likely, the player will plateau rather quickly, leaving the front office with the challenging decision of keep or try to deal for a better fit.
Reason II – The worst NBA team will have no better than a 14 percent chance at the top NBA pick beginning in 2019
The 2018 NBA Draft is the last year of 25 percent odds to the last place team for the top NBA pick. Beginning in 2019, the bottom three teams all share a 14 percent odds of getting the top pick. While some may say “so what?”, the difference is huge. The NBA market, like every professional sports market, is tied to the love-hate relationship of parity. Parity in sports means that over the span of time, all things being equal, each team has an even chance of succeeding.
But in the NBA, nothing could be further from the truth. Teams which lose in the NBA may be poorly managed, but once down, the system keeps that team down. The reason is the free agency market. Elite players can choose which teams they wish to play on based on their playoff projections. Teams which were lucky enough to find an elite player can overpay based on the NBA-CBA (Collective Bargaining Agreement). That means teams without much hope of the NBA playoffs and without an elite player in their ranks are shut out. Their only chance of success was the NBA Draft.
NBA stacked the deck, and the draft
We’ve already proven how difficult drafting for future success can be with the existing rules. But the new rules which go into effect in 2019 create even more hurdles via deteriorating odds in the NBA Draft. Now teams once assured a top-four pick will now face a top-five scenario. And teams once blessed with a 25 percent chance at the top-pick must now face the less exciting future of a 14 percent chance.
Those favorable odds are now distributed over more bad teams. Conceivably, the worst team in the NBA could be shut out of a top-three draft pick for several years. In fact, the worst team in the NBA has a 47.9 percent chance of landing the fifth pick in the NBA Draft, while the team who just missed the playoffs still has a remote chance of the top-pick. So the bad will find an even greater struggle to improve, as rebuilding via the draft is even more shallow than before.
Reason III – No other NBA team is set up to “mass mentor” young players for the foreseeable future.
Rebuilding a competitive NBA team from scratch is more than adding multiple top talents via the draft. Once they arrive, rookies must be coached-up, mentored, and developed. Since no two NBA players are the same, that means different techniques must be used for different players. It also means that different coaches must be included in developing young talent.
Most NBA teams do not focus on that aspect of the team. Some do. The Boston Celtics head coach Brad Stevens has a reputation for coaching up young talent. But team president Danny Ainge is quite careful in limiting the number and roles of young players on the team. Even that being said, Celtics rookies are as hot and cold as any rookies in the league. They simply have plenty of veteran support to mask the impact.
Rebuilding teams must trust rookies
But a rebuilding team must take chances on young players. Right now, that translates into the Atlanta Hawks, the Dallas Mavericks, the Memphis Grizzlies, and the Chicago Bulls. Some teams have already initiated a youth movement. Some are stuck between veterans and youth. Still others are still heavily invested in veterans.
The trouble with rebuilding in the NBA is the trust factor. Young players must learn through experience. That is both the good and the bad experience. And the frequency of bad experiences takes a special type of head coach. A head coach too focused on winning gives young teams doubts. On the other hand, a head coach too focused on development gives young teams too little emphasis on the ultimate goal. In the end, there are only a handful of NBA coaches who can walk that fine line between good coach/bad coach for a young team. And right now, they are all on the Philadelphia 76ers coaching staff.
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In the end, I simply cannot see any NBA team investing heavily in the second round and undrafted ranks over multiple seasons. And for the 2018 NBA Draft, only the Phoenix Suns have six picks (the same number as the Philadelphia 76ers). NBA parity is a key concept to the NBA’s future. But much like the teams making up the 30 franchise league, their focus is on the optics for today.