The Sixers added another defeat to a collection of “Was that the worst loss of the season?” games this year, falling 123-115 to an injured Pelicans team that suspended their best player for the game two hours before tip-off.
Here’s what I saw.
The Good
— Nobody got hurt that I’m aware of?
The Bad
— While everyone keyed in on Philadelphia’s lack of rebounding and a natural power forward in the offseason, we here at PHLY spotlighted another problem: the absence of playmakers. Now that we’re almost halfway through the season, we can get a little bit meaner about it. They don’t have enough smart basketball players on this team to consistently generate good offense. It’s either Maxey, George, or Embiid doing something awesome, or it’s likely to be a bad possession.
I do not see a lack of effort out of basically anyone on this team, which is to their credit in the middle of a brutal year. But they always feel one moment away from the next bad decision, whether it’s a drive into a crowded paint, a contested three, an errant pass, or a miscommunication for a sloppy turnover. Rhythm is elusive or often nonexistent, which is what happens when no one other than your stars can ad-lib. The Sixers are a bad offensive team for many reasons, but this ranks at the top for me.
When you have a surplus of shooting and firepower, you can get away with some lapses in situational awareness. But the Sixers certainly don’t have a claim to that. Instead, every positive run they go on tends to fall short of the bigger goal, undone by a backbreaking, mind-numbing turnover or a stream of missed jumpers.
(That possession on Friday night? A play that featured Jose Alvarado surprising George from behind in signature fashion.)
When you are starved for points on a regular basis, it eventually bleeds into the other side of the floor. This was the second game this week where it felt like the Sixers had the defensive floor drop out from under their feet in the second half. There were blown rotations, missed assignments, and Pelicans running free under the basket. If the Sixers can’t defend, they are cooked.
— We have showered a lot of love on Guerschon Yabusele in this space, and he has earned it, but there was eventually going to be a time when playing an undersized power forward at center would come back to haunt Philadelphia. Friday night was that game: Yabusele was out of his depth trying to hold down the fort at the rim.
— Rollercoaster of a game for Paul George. His propensity to pick up silly fouls has been another worrying trend in recent weeks — I joked to colleague Derek Bodner after George picked up his second that it was a matter of time before he was in foul trouble with a third and out of the game. Moments later, the foul came right on schedule.
During that sequence, George didn’t get a foul call on a drive that he thought he deserved, and he reacted by taking a silly one while running back in transition. That earned him a spot alongside Nick Nurse for the rest of the first half. He certainly hasn’t earned the trust to play through foul trouble, and it’s not as though his offensive production at halftime warranted a long leash.
To George’s credit, he came out of the halftime tunnel and noticeably stepped his game up. His energy on the defensive end was really good, and he finally got some shots to go down in the early moments of the third. And once the confidence started building, you saw a glimpse of the player the Sixers believed they were getting to star with Maxey and Embiid. A turnaround jumper on one possession turned into a pull-up three the next, before a drive-and-kick the next time down was a made three for Eric Gordon. The offense ran almost exclusively through him for a portion of the second half, and he made good choice after good choice, shot after shot after shot. He posted a great line for a guy who opened it 1/6.
By that point, though, the Sixers were already sort of drowning, and his makes were just helping them stay afloat rather than a means to earn them a win. He doesn’t have the luxury to be a one-half player in these circumstances. Unfair or not, that’s the pressure he has to deal with. If you’re not hitting shots, lock in on defense, or vice versa. It can’t all fall apart at once.
— Aside from shooting threes as if he were holding a medicine ball, this is everything you could have asked for from Tyrese Maxey. This is what a step forward should look like — Maxey reacting to what the game is giving him instead of just going 100 miles an hour with no plan.
He got off to a strong start in the first quarter. There was better craft shown as a downhill player and decisionmaker, with Maxey earning free throws with patience and pump fakes, rather than hoping he would get bailed out while falling out of bounds. And with the Pelicans loading up to slow him down, he was measured with his passing, swinging the ball to shooters and leaving the rest of the work to his teammates. We even got a beautiful skip pass to the corner on a pick-and-roll with Adem Bona, resulting in a made three for Kelly Oubre in the corner.
By halftime, Maxey already had eight assists, and it was a perfect reflection of Maxey’s patience. Pulling his in-between game out of the ether, Maxey got into a few midrange pull-ups on Friday night, disarming the Pelicans when they tried to load up on him at the rim.
The bad part here was New Orleans effectively taking him out of the game for the last quarter and a half. They did a good job of getting the ball out of his hands with early doubles, and zone defense was another good gambit by Willie Green, as it prompted more ball swinging and less attacking from Maxey.
— Normally, you have to worry about Kelly Oubre missing threes. Friday night, he shot the ball well from deep and decided layups were going to be his cross to bear. I loved his energy, mind you, but missing that many shorties is painful.
(Credit to Yves Missi for his paint protection, of course, but hard to put it all on him when a 6’8″ wing hits the underside of the rim on a layup attempt.
— Let me repeat for the 25th time: it is preposterous that they are holding open a roster spot while being in such a dire state in the backcourt. And they currently have an open two-way slot to use, too, after cutting Pete Nance. A team with serious aspirations, assuming that’s still true of the Sixers, cannot rely on the Jackson/Dowtin/Lowry combo the rest of the year.
The Ugly
— Jose Alvarado rocks.
— Being down at halftime to a team as banged up as the Pelicans are would have been bad enough. They also suspended their best player two hours before tip-off with no reinforcements to make up for him. And then the Sixers lost the game outright. This season is a nightmare.
— I don’t care if it makes me sound like I am a thousand years old, the excessive noise during timeouts at Sixers games is absurd. Playing absurdly loud music and shooting off t-shirt cannons while an official was trying to say whether the home team’s challenge was successful or not sent me over the edge. I’m also going to be deaf by 50 because of all their shenanigans, but setting that aside, the focus should be basketball at a basketball game. Controversial opinion, I know!
