What The Sixers Should Learn From The NBA Finals

Consistency and stability are important for a team.

There is nothing the Sixers can do about this, just a reminder they’ve botched nearly every important decision after the Sam Hinkie regime, and are paying the price.

This is funny when you consider the fact that the Heat were a play-in team that made the NBA Finals, but that was flukey when you take into consideration the history of the league. Congratulations to the Heat on their historic run, but this should not be something teams should attempt to replicate.

Maybe Embiid could take it easy down the stretch of next year when it is closer to playoff time, but doing this the entire season would be a mistake. Jokic appeared to dial things back once it became clear his team would be the top seed in the Western Conference whether he dominated or not. Of course, this would not be possible without good coaching and teammates, but even with their flaws, the next iteration of the Sixers appears to meet the requirements to some extent.

The Nuggets beat up on teams in the regular season and were rewarded with a playoff run that included three play-in teams. Meanwhile, the Sixers had Doc Rivers forfeiting games by playing Montrezl Harrell and refusing to experiment with or develop the young players. Christian Braun, Max Strus, Gabe Vincent, Caleb Martin, and Haywood Highsmith (Sixers legend) were all key players in this year’s playoffs because Michael Malone and Erik Spoelstra were willing to play them, while Rivers preferred to stunt the development of the team’s second best player in Tyrese Maxey, (Harden does not care about playoff basketball enough to qualify) and the team’s only playable backup center in Paul Reed.