As the title says, the Philadelphia 76ers are the most impossible squad to predict in the entire association. After the turnout everyone saw last season, the team has an ample range of possibilities with respect to how their campaign could look like, and there is likewise no other ball club who packs more variance than them as regards the factors that will be at play.
In an ideal world, the 76ers stay healthy for the most part and finish as one of the best teams in the Eastern Conference. Normally, that would be a preternatural projection for a team that just finished with the fifth-worst record in the league, but they are far from your ordinary cellar-dwelling squad.
But having said that, they are also very capable of carving out an even worse campaign. This team, after all, touts too many glaring red flags that expecting everything to fall in line with their picturesque scenarios would perhaps be asking for way too much from the basketball gods and the laws of nature. It’s that drastic.
As a result, people should probably forego looking at the numerical prognostications, odds, and whatnot ahead of the 2025-26 season. They simply matter the least with this team.
Forget about predicting what could happen with the 76ers next season — it’s impossible
Joel Embiid, for example, will most likely miss a significant chunk of the season — and that’s not even being pessimistic. The current status quo has him not doing on-court activities yet, which plays in tangent with the nightmare scenario of him still not being in playing shape.
There is also Paul George, who is likewise nursing an injury of his own for which he underwent surgery. There is no telling if he would be ready for training camp, much less for the season opener, and recent history points to him being way more likely to miss a bunch of games even if he recovers just in time.
Aside from injuries, the 76ers — like any other team — are vulnerable to the natural ebbs and flows of the league. Less loosely, we are referring to the fact that the teams expected to be “worse” than them could easily make a giant leap or two. And given the brewing superiority of teams that are being patient with their youth movement, Philly could find itself lagging behind those clubs.
The Eastern Conference — and the league in general — will be very unforgiving for the Philadelphia 76ers next season. But the beauty of it is that this team also has what it takes to buck trends and make a grand comeback, although of course, there is also a real — if not strong — possibility of things taking a nosedive.