Big issue 1: Three of the Sixers’ five starters are free agents, so that’s obviously important. But the biggest question facing the franchise has to be this: Exactly how good are the two core young players, the only significant remnants left over from the pain of "The Process"?
That would be Ben Simmons and Joel Embiid, both of whom go into the offseason dogged by obvious deficiencies.
For Embiid, it’s simply a matter of health. To be fair, his main problem in the Toronto series was an illness, what the team was calling a respiratory infection. That can happen to anyone. But heading into the playoffs, remember, Embiid was nursing a bad knee that cost him 14 games down the stretch, and he sat out Game 3 of the first-round win over Brooklyn.
The Sixers are built around Embiid, and when he is good, they’re really tough to beat. He is an elite player at both ends of the floor, but the biggest number for him remains games played. He missed 18 of them this year after missing 19 last year, and health kept him from being effective in the conference semis. As good as Embiid is, his health will always loom over the franchise like a cloud.
Simmons is a different story. He’s healthy, but his third year in the league — his second on the floor — did not yield much by way of improvement.
He made the All-Star team mostly because the Sixers had a good record and there were not many other great guards in the East. His numbers were solid, too. He is still a good finisher at the rim who scored 16.9 points per game and an elite playmaker who averaged 7.7 assists and 8.1 rebounds this season.
It’s nice to have a 6-9 point guard who can defend and rebound, but Simmons has shown no signs of putting in work on his shooting. That is a problem for Philly on the floor because it allows teams to leave Simmons defensively, but it is a problem for the Sixers off the floor, too.
Because if Simmons is a foundation player, what does it say about the franchise if he has no interest in working to improve an obvious flaw?
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Big issue 2: It’s unlikely that new general manager Elton Brand will take the fall for the failure of this team. That honor will go to coach Brett Brown, who dragged the Sixers through "The Process" years and got them into East contender-ship. Whether Brown is the coach who can push the team to the Finals, though, has been a question all year and could cost him his job this summer.
But the missteps Brand has made are a problem here, too. He mortgaged the team’s future assets — Dario Saric, Landry Shamet, the Heat’s 2021 draft pick, a 2020 draft pick — to bring in two free agents, Jimmy Butler and Tobias Harris. He also dumped former No. 1 pick Markelle Fultz for virtually no return.
Now the Sixers have to pony up for Butler and Harris, who did not get the Sixers any deeper in the playoffs than they got last year, or risk losing those assets for nothing.
Free-agent outlook: Because they gave up so much for free agents Butler and Harris, the Sixers are locked into trying to keep both guys. It’s likely they can and will, but Butler will be pursued by other teams — Brooklyn and both Los Angeles teams are possibilities — and might decide he does not much believe in the work ethic shown by Simmons and Embiid. That’s what drove him out of Minnesota, remember.
Harris is more likely to stay because the Sixers can offer him more money than any other team, and it’s doubtful that those possibly interested in Harris — Dallas, maybe Utah — would be willing to go to a full max offer for him. They could flirt enough with Harris to force Philly to go to a max deal, however.
There’s also the JJ Redick question to consider. He was patient with the team last year, allowing it to do other business before circling back to re-sign him. Redick won’t likely wait around for the Sixers this year, not if he can sign a deal in the $15 million per year range. And giving Redick that kind of contract, with the other obligations Philly will have, would put the Sixers into a long-term luxury tax danger zone.
Lose Redick, though, and you lose your best floor-stretcher. Redick shot 39.7 percent on 3-pointers, taking 8.0 per game.
The Sixers could emerge from this summer looking like exactly the kind of team "The Process" was designed to avoid becoming — a tax-paying, respectable Eastern Conference contender good enough to get to the second round but not good enough to move beyond that.
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The young folks: Shamet proved to be a very solid pick, but he was traded in the Harris deal and wound up as a starter for the Clippers. That’s a young folk the Sixers would like to have back.
Rookie Zhaire Smith played only six games, mostly because of injury, and 2016 first-rounder Furkan Korkmaz had some good stretches early in the year but did not play much down the stretch. Korkmaz shot only 32.6 percent from the 3-point line in his second season, but he still looks like a guy who could contribute as a shooter off the bench, maybe as soon as next season.
The team did not put a lot of developmental time into young big man Jonah Bolden, which turned out to be unfortunate because the Sixers could have used him in the postseason when injuries weakened the frontcourt.
But Simmons, at age 22, is the young guy who matters most. His field-goal percentage improved from 54.5 percent to 56.3 percent, but that was mostly because Simmons almost completely eliminated all shots from outside the paint.
Most star players, if they were poor shooters like Simmons, would work on the shot in the offseason and try to work it into their games the following year. Simmons, though, went deeper into his shell like a frightened turtle. In all, 88.1 percent of his shots last season were in the paint, and he averaged only 1.3 midrange shots per game. This year, incredibly, he shot more in the paint, 92.4 percent. That’s only 0.8 midrange shots per game.
Beyond the arc? Simmons missed all 11 3-pointers he attempted last year. This year, he missed them all, too, but attempted only six.
So, yes, Simmons’ shooting went up, but not because he expanded his game and got better. It went up because he contracted his game. That’s not a good sign.
Wait till next year: Free agency will go a long way toward deciding whether the Sixers can maintain their spot as a contender in the East. But even if the Sixers re-sign everyone, Philadelphia will struggle if Simmons can’t improve and Embiid can’t stay healthy. All this could cost Brown his job, too.
It will be a fascinating franchise to watch in the offseason, and if all goes well, a fun team to watch next season.