Sixers

The Worst Choke Job You Will Ever See – Thoughts on Hawks 109, Sixers 106 (Game 5)

By Kevin Kinkead

Published: Jun 17th, 2021 · 8:55 AM EDT

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When Charles Barkley guaranteed a Sixers win during the TNT pregame show, did that make you nervous? It should have.

That’s when we knew the jinx was on. The choke job of a lifetime. A collapse for the ages. Not even Roget’s Thesaurus has enough words to describe the absolute abomination we witnessed on Wednesday night. It was nothing short of a monolithic disgrace. We watched a 15-0 Atlanta run over the final 4:30 of the game. Two missed free throws from the otherwise stellar Joel Embiid. Tobias Harris invisible throughout and Ben Simmons a half court ghost. A max contract apparition hovering in the dunker spot.

It was a mentally weak performance devoid of heart and guts.

And that’s disappointing to say, because you try your best to be fair and not kill these guys, to not go the cheap sports talk radio route with constant Negadelphia bitching and moaning, but holy shit does this team deserve what’s coming. They deserve to be outright lambasted on every media platform in the Delaware Valley. That was a pitiful loss. Pathetic! Every bit of criticism is 100% warranted after blowing two straight huge leads to the Atlanta Hawks, who looked more like the ’96 Bulls in that fourth quarter. The Sixers’ “gave ’em the friggin game,” as Jim Mora once said.

We’ve tried to call it down the middle this season and give credit to a team that really deserved it. Harris was a borderline All Star. Embiid probably deserved MVP. Simmons had a great defensive year. It seemed like this group might have “it” and finally get over the hump. They were a #1 seed with the easiest path to the Finals that you will ever see. They entered the postseason with home court advantage and were on the opposite side of the bracket from Brooklyn and Milwaukee, yet here we are looking at a team down 3-2 to the #5 seed.

It is incomprehensible.

You realize that this is pretty much it, right? Either they rally for a miracle trip to the Conference Finals or go down in a spectacular fireball of underperformance, with the noise surrounding Simmons and Harris getting so loud that not even Spinal Tap will be able to hear it. This very well may have been the cresting of the wave, and the final hurrah for a group that we thought had so much more to give. It’s up to them to come out and show some desire in games 6 and 7, or else they go down in the history books as one of the most disappointing Philadelphia sports teams of all time.

Get ready for all of it. Get ready to hear that The Process was a failure  and that Simmons is unplayable. Harris isn’t a max player. Doc Rivers is a choker and Embiid is cooked, etc. The worst part is that all of it might be true, and it’s all gonna come out like a pungent basketball stench escaping Pandora’s Box and permeating your nostrils, rendering you unconscious.

Hack-a-Ben, part three

Where was this game lost? Jesus, I don’t know. You could point to any number of things. Second half turnovers, bench lineup coughing it up at the end of the third, Rivers’ insistence on playing through Curry and Embiid and nobody else down the stretch. It’s impossible to compartmentalize everything that went wrong last night, but if there’s one stat that says it all, it’s this one:

Joel Embiid and Seth Curry were the only 76ers to make a field goal in the 2nd half – they're the only duo in the last 15 postseasons to make all their team's baskets in a half.

They're also the first duo since the merger with 35+ points on 60% shooting each in a playoff loss.

— OptaSTATS (@OptaSTATS) June 17, 2021

It should hurt your brain after reading that.

Said Doc Rivers:

“I thought it started at the beginning of the second half. Even though we kept the lead, we had six turnovers in our first ten possessions to start the third quarter. That’s why I called the timeout. We sort of exhaled and relaxed. The first unit was just good enough and Seth carried us during that stretch to keep the lead at 22. It could have easily been at 30 if we don’t turn the ball over. Obviously you have to take guys out and the second unit struggled tonight in the second half. They were phenomenal in the first and struggled in the second. And then down the stretch we scored 19 and gave up 40. So it’s on us, it’s on all of us. It’s on me and the players and we have to figure out how to get back up, which we will, and bring this back here for Game 7.”

RE: Hack-a-Ben, this is how the fouling routine played out in the fourth quarter:

Sixers up 102-94, Simmons gets fouled with 4:23 on the clock… and knocks both down! That was quite the surprise after he started 2-10 from the line to begin the night.

The Hawks did it again with 3:31 on the clock and he missed both, which resulted in Atlanta coming down the floor, getting a dunk, and then Doc Rivers used his third timeout and subbed Shake Milton in for Simmons. After Trae Young hit a bucket to cut the lead to four, they brought Simmons back in at 2:29 during a shot clock stoppage.

So it was always feasible take him off and put him back in, despite the bullshit that Rivers fed us after Game 4 in Washington.

On this particular night, he said this of Simmons’ lack of involvement:

“You play minutes without Ben during the game, so I think we’re equipped for that. We’re ready to do that. Obviously we did it tonight. Do you want to do that is the better question. The answer would be no. When Ben makes them we get to keep him in and when he doesn’t, we can’t. That’s just the way it is. Some nights we still do if it’s working our way. In the first half we kept him in because we were increasing the lead and they were getting in foul trouble. Fourth quarter you don’t worry about foul trouble so you have to make them.”

Simmons was 4-14 from the line on the night despite being a 61% FT shooter this season. He’s shooting 32.8% this postseason.

It’s just pitiful. There’s no other way to say it. All of the Instagram videos, all of the offseason stuff, blah blah blah. Doc Rivers scolding the media and telling us Simmons’ lack of offensive growth is no big deal. It all culminated in one big joke last night and unless Ben goes out in games 6 and 7 and turns it around, he’s never going to live this down.

Tobias Harris

He’s been fantastic this postseason but in a critical Game 5 he contributed four points on 2-11 shooting and wanted nothing to do with the ball in the fourth quarter, when it did find him. There was one play where he had the ball on the perimeter and gave it back to Shake Milton, and that’s all you need to know. Five years and $180 million, you have to make yourself available in those spots, even if the offense is primarily being run through Embiid and Curry.

Joel Embiid

Uber elite in the first half, but in the second half of the last two games he’s hit only three of his 20+ shots. They’ve been closing through him and Harris all season long, and if those two aren’t getting it done, ain’t nobody getting it done.

Seth Curry

Not his fault. He put the team on his back and Rivers went to him heavily down the stretch. It is what it is.

What I can say is that the Crossing Broad Slack channel participant who called him “Sleepy Seth” all year long should be ashamed of himself.

My original lede

This was the original lede I wrote and then had to delete when the Sixers choked:

“The Sixers went out and beat the brakes off the Atlanta Hawks on Wednesday night to take a 3-2 series lead and all but wrap this thing up. There’s zero chance they lose two straight to this team. Seriously. If the Hawks win this series I’ll quit my job at Crossing Broad and go work at the new Wawa down “by the stadium,” and when I say “by the stadium,” I mean two miles west, at the base of the Platt Bridge. 

This one is a stone cold, lead pipe lock, as Tony Bruno used to say. Put the Hawks in the bagster. This series is over. It’s awesome baby! (Dick Vitale voice).” 

Bummer. It was pretty good, wasn’t it?

Other notes:

• Allen Iverson and Aaron McKie rang the bell.
• George Hill has been a massive disappointment.
• If the Sixers crash out, at least we have the Eagles to look forward to!