Either the Philadelphia 76ers did not anticipate the team’s playoff push this year, or they failed the team last off-season. But the Philadelphia 76ers bench is the team’s Achilles Heel as they near the NBA Playoffs
The Philadelphia 76ers starting five are outperforming virtually everyone’s expectations. With center Joel Embiid, power forward Dario Saric, small forward Robert Covington, shooting guard J.J. Redick and point guard Ben Simmons, the team matches up well with nearly every starting five in the NBA. But when you try to talk about the five players off the bench, well it gets dicey. Who is Joel Embiid’s pimary backup? Robert Covington’s?
We know that T.J. McConnell runs the teams offense when Ben Simmons rests. But are we comfortable that both Marco Belinelli and Ersan Ilyasova, two recent signings after the NBA deadline, are the primary scorers off the bench?
We musta’ got lost
In short, the Philadelphia 76ers had an entire season to prepare for post season. How could the front office abandon their responsibility of giving head coach Brett Brown the best team this season?
In short… oops! Their bad.
In the modern NBA, there is no excuse for a team to miss so badly on their own upside, or to misguess their fundamental needs off the bench. This is not the first team led by Bryan Colangelo. And the front office staff he has surrounded himself with all got high praises on their hirings.
So where did the Philadelphia 76ers go wrong with this bench this season?
Bad bench Brett Brown or Bryan Colangelo?
Was an oversight? Was it an underestimation? Or did some other factor play a hand in this error? We explored the Philadelphia ‘bad bench’ play a week ago from the perspective that casual fans, elated with the Philadelphia Eagles success, wanted similar and immediate results from the Philadelphia 76ers team. After all, the NFL operates identically as the NBA, right?
All in all, the Philadelphia 76ers are very young, had two players on the bench due to injuries, had an unfilled position, and fought through injuries to the starters. Those bandwagon fans blamed the team’s shortcomings on Coach Brown. I merely wanted to set the record straight. In the end, the shortcoming from the front office surprised even me. Bryan Colangelo allowed the team’s roster to go with just 14 players for ten entire weeks while they pursued a playoff berth. Ten weeks, while the team already had two players out for the season? That almost resembles a tanking strategy, doesn’t it?
For even more on this topic, check out: Philadelphia 76ers are flirting with disaster
Bryan Colangelo’s bench
The Philadelphia 76ers starters were inherited. Either on the team’s roster, or the obvious pick in the 2016 NBA Draft. But the Philadelphia 76ers bench is, for the most part, that of Bryan Colangelo, and that is where concerns begin to build. For all the pieces which place this Philadelphia 76ers team in the position to make the playoffs, only J.J. Redick originated from Colangelo’s efforts.
Ben Simmons was the obvious pick for 2016. And the decision to trade up for Markelle Fultz certainly came from Bryan Colangelo. But it was the pick-swap negotiated by the previous front office with the Sacramento Kings which landed the 76ers at the three pick. And it was that same previous regime which dealt for the other first-round picks used to trade up. And all the while, Markelle Fultz, while on the team due to Colangelo’s trade up to grab him, has not delivered. Even the draft picks from Colangelo ended up parking overseas. While I strongly advocated for Timothe Luwawu-Cabarrot and Furkan Korkmaz, even I admit that they have not delivered this season for the team.
More fizzle than sizzle
There can be no denial that Bryan Colangelo signed both Jerryd Bayless and Amir Johnson to the Philadelphia 76ers roster. He had history with both during his days with the Toronto Raptors. Neither player has delivered much for the Sixers. In fact, Jerryd Bayless was signed to a three-year deal, and played in just three games his entire first year. Under-performance has limited him to just 39 appearances this season.
So too Amir Johnson signed up for one season. With the immediate demotion of Jahlil Okafor to the garbage chute, Johnson became the primary reserve for center. It was not pretty. Johnson started 10 games for the 76ers, and appeared in 61 contests. Despite average playing time to 15 minutes per game, his fouls remained at 2.6. Scoring, rebounding and other productive stats dropped off from a year ago.
FOR ANOTHER PERSPECTIVE ON RESERVES, CHECK OUT: Philadelphia 76ers need C Anzejs Pasecniks for 2018-2019 season
Veterans don’t deliver
The hope this year was for Amir Johnson to deliver some level of offense, and much greater defense, than delivered. Jerryd Bayless was aimed at delivering a hybrid role at either guard position. Recall that the team had not yet validated Ben Simmons as a player capable of playing the point guard role. Bayless was the veteran insurance to ensure Simmons could transition to running the team’s offense.
Instead of Simmons struggling, Bayless didn’t meet expectations. Delivering 7.9 points per game was too light when factoring in his defense. If you trust the Player Efficiency Rating , Bayless is performing below that of Jahlil Okafor, who was practically given away. Apparently the synchronization of what Bryan Colangelo sees as team needs does not match what the Sixers need. If that continues, that’s a huge problem for the team.
Here comes the trade deadline, there goes the trade deadline
The team ran aground of player injuries. Rookies Markelle Fultz (shoulder) and Furkan Korkmaz (foot) both fell to injury,and neither appear to be returning this season. Had Fultz remained on track, by now he would not only be a hot-handed shooter off the bench, but he may have replaced J.J. Redick in the starting lineup. Had Furkan Korkmaz remained healthy, he most certainly would have seen quality playing minutes when Redick was injured. Would that have made a difference in his role going forward? Perhaps or perhaps not. But the team would know the pecking order of the wing assets from experience.
Now, all the team can do is revise their original projections.
No upgrade
The Philadelphia 76ers, due to their unique circumstances, were truly in need of a trade to upgrade their bench. Ideally, any trade would have moved either Amir Johnson, Jerryd Bayless, or both in return for a productive player or players who could come off the bench for the 76ers to help this playoff push. The trade deadline came, the trade deadline went. The Bucks picked up backup center Tyler Zeller for shooting guard Rashad Vaughn and a 2020 second round pick.
That is a deal the Philadelphia 76ers could have matched, and it would have given the team solid reserve help behind Joel Embiid. In the end, the team let the trade deadline pass by unheralded. The team opted to sign buyout players. Cheap low-risk moves? Absolutely. Enough to turn the tide on the bench? Perhaps, but more likely too little too late.
This bench needs a plan
Have you ever visited someone’s home where the furniture seems to clash directly with every other piece of furniture in the room? Right now, the Philadelphia 76ers bench feels like that. Yes, part of Bryan Colangelo’s inheritance from the previous regime included pieces which did not fit the space, pace, pass mantra. But those players, Jahlil Okafor and Nik Stauskas, were traded to the Brooklyn Nets for Trevor Booker. Booker was already cut by the team. And to add insult to injury, the Philadelphia 76ers kicked in a second round pick to make the deal go down.
The team did worse than just outright cutting Okafor and Stauskas. Imagine that. Cutting both players would have saved the team a 2nd round pick. One day, that will matter.
YOU WILL ENJOY READING: Philadelphia 76ers President Bryan Colangelo focus on winning today
Who’s role is it anyways?
But the true issue was not what the team did not get in compensation, but the fiasco that followed. It was as though the entire objective of the front office was to rid the team of Okafor. When that happened, they rested. On one hand, they didn’t address the empty roster spot. On the other hand, they didn’t act to swap misfiring parts in trades to bring in more compatible parts.
In face, they simply rested. Whose responsibility it was, did not get the 76ers bench ready for post season. And the bench failed the head coach because it was undermanned, full of injured players, and simply did not offer players who could play in the higher paced 76ers scheme. Whatever the Philadelphia 76ers intended to do, they simply didn’t get it done. And that is not a good sign for a team trying to get to the playoffs for the first time. It was as though the front office was on the wrong page all along.
Bench to bench
Ultimately, the Philadelphia 76ers signed Ersan Ilyasova on February 28 2018. So lets compare the benches of the 76ers to their opponents since that signing head to head. Or better yet, bench to bench:
Team Outcome Score Their bench score Our bench score
Cleveland Cavaliers W 108- 97 37 Pts 25 Pts
Charlotte Hornets W 110- 99 37 Pts 29 Pts
Milwaukee Bucks L 110-118 32 Pts 28 Pts
Chalotte Hornets W 128-114 51 Pts 39 Pts
Miami Heat L 99-108 46 Pts 31 Pts
Brooklyn Nets W 120- 97 43 Pts 26 Pts
Indiana Pacers L 98-101 31 Pts 15 Pts
New York Knicks W 118-110 35 Pts 22 Pts
Brooklyn Nets W 120-116 52 Pts 33 Pts
The pattern is … horrendous
So do you see the pattern? In each game, the Philadelphia 76ers must not only outplay their opposing team counterparts, but they must outperform the other team’s starter by 10 points or better. Who though this was a good idea?
More disturbing is the unanimous deficit of the Philadelphia 76ers bench to their opponent. And the fact that the team is 6-3 despite this bench shortcoming. How long can these Philadelphia 76ers keep up bucking this trend? Clearly the team surprised itself by benching Markelle Fultz the entire season. If Fultz played now, that would either place his production, of that of J.J. Redick, onto the bench. But the result of the personnel office’s series of inactions has placed this team into a precarious position. Even if the starting 5 outplay their opponent, can they push the team beyond the bench shortfall?
Remedy that situation now
The Philadelphia 76ers cannot hope to advance far in the NBA Playoffs with this constant deficit. The team cannot rely upon the young core to not only take their game to the next level, but to take it so high that the bench won’t lose the game for the team. Here are some fixes:
Use a minimum of a 10-11 man rotation – the team has abandoned playing Richaun Holmes, Justin Anderson, and Timothe Luwawu-Cabarrot. The team needs to reverse that trend. Give these younger players opportunity heading into the playoffs. The impact cannot be much worse than the current results. And any experience earned by one of these three young men only benefit the team during the demands of postseason play.
Want to learn more about Justin Anderson? Check out: With defense struggling, Justin Anderson might deserve minutes
Place players in roles to succeed
The Philadelphia 76ers rotated Richaun Holmes to the five, Timothe Luwawu-Cabarrot to the three, and the team pushes Justin Anderson out to the four. Enough. Ilyasova at five, Holmes to four, Anderson to three, Belinelli and TLC at two, and T.J. McConnell through the one. Versatility is important with skilled players comfortable on the basketball court. The young core of this team should not be expected to play a different role in each game in this pressure packed environment.
Next: Forget Markelle Fultz (this season anyway)
Limit their variables. Place them into the same role. Give them time to grow comfortable. Even if a player gets just five minutes in the game. That’s five minutes a starter rests. And it’s five minutes of playing time as the team approaches post-season. The season is too far gone to fix this. But the team must make changes to compensate placing far too much of the game’s outcomes on the starting five lineup. To win in post season, the Philadelphia 76ers must win as a team.