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Friday Mount Rushmore: Best Individual Seasons in Sixers History

Kevin Kinkead

By Kevin Kinkead

Published:

It’s time for another installment of the important Friday Mount Rushmore column.

Last week we shifted topics with a column about the late rapper DMX.

This week we’re gonna get it back to Philly sports, and pay homage to the best individual seasons in Sixers history, a post inspired by the numbers Joel Embiid is currently putting up. We are witnessing an all-time Philadelphia performance from Joel this year, and as such, now seems like a good time to pause, reflect, and pick out the cream of the crop in this category.

Allen Iverson, 2000-2001

At the time, A.I. was six feet tall and 165 pounds, and won the MVP award in a season that featured prime Shaq, prime Jerry Stackhouse, and a 22-year-old Kobe Bryant who was averaging 28.5 points per game.

Iverson’s Sixers started the season 10-0 and finished 56-26. They went to the NBA Finals and even stole a road game from the Lakers, with A.I. stepping over Tyronn Lue in what amounted to one of the most iconic moments in Philadelphia sports history. He led the squad and the entire league with 31.1 points per game.

This took place 20 years ago, so most Crossing Broad readers will remember it well, but if there’s anything to stress to a younger generation that didn’t watch this season, it’s that Iverson put a cast of role players on his back. They had a solid rim protector in Dikembe Mutombo, and played a blue collar defensive game, but the second-leading scorer on the squad was Theo Ratliff, who averaged 12.4. Mutombo and Aaron McKie were right behind him. They had Eric Snow and Tyrone Hill and George Lynch and Matt Geiger. On paper, that team had no business going to the Finals, which is what made the underdog run and Iverson’s individual performance that season so special.

Joel Embiid, 2020-2021

I think sometimes we don’t realize how incredible Embiid is because we see the excellence so frequently that we become numb to it.

It’s one of those things where you have to kind of take a step back, put the numbers aside, and just focus on what he’s doing on the floor. Turnaround, fadeaway jumpers. Dirk Nowitzki back-foot baseline looks. Hakeem Olajuwon Dream Shakes. He’s become a three-level scorer while playing like a small forward in a seven-footer’s body. He is getting to the foul line at a record-shattering pace. He shoots 85% from the stripe. He hits the three at 38.9%. And on the defensive end he is an elite rim protector who alters shots and can play high-level pick and roll coverage.

Embiid is 27 years old and smack dab in the middle of his prime. It’s been a pleasure – nay – a privilege, to watch him this season.

https://twitter.com/TheHoopCentral/status/1381771955972362243?s=20

Wilt Chamberlain, 1966-1967

The parameters here are individual Sixers seasons, so we won’t count Wilt’s 1961/62 campaign, when he went for 50.4 points per game.

Instead, we’ll go with the 1966/67 season, when he won league MVP en route to a Sixers title. That squad went 68-13, which is a franchise-record .840 winning percentage. To this day, it remains the fifth-best single-season winning percentage in NBA history, surpassed only by Steph Curry’s Warriors, Michael Jordan’s Bulls, and a Lakers team featuring…. Wilt Chamberlain.

Statistically, Wilt went for 24.1 points and 24.2 rebounds in this season, which is insane. He played 81 games at 45.5 minutes per, which is also insane. He shot 68.3% from the floor and tossed 7.8 assists as well. He only took 14.2 field goal attempts per game.

And in the playoffs he went for 22/29/9 playing 47.9 minutes on average. Wilt had a fantastic supporting cast, too, featuring Hal Greer, Billy Cunningham, Chet Walker, Luke Jackson, and Wali Jones.

Moses Malone, 1982-1983

It feels criminal to leave Doctor J and Charles Barkley off the list, but I think Moses gets the edge here because he was league MVP in a Sixers championship season.

Moses played 78 games in the Fo’ Fo’ Fo’ year, averaging 24.5 points and 15.3 rebounds. He shot 50% from the floor and 76% from the foul line. Those individual numbers are actually a slight dip from the 1981-1982 season, but the thing that really pops is what he did in the playoff run, when the Sixers lost a grand total of one game en route to the title.

In that 12-1 postseason run, he went for 26.8 points, 15.8 rebounds, 1.5 steals, and 1.9 blocks per game. He shot 54% on 18 shots per game. Everything he did in the regular season improved in the postseason, and he was doing it against opponents like Magic Johnson, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, and Bill Cartwright.

 

Honorable mention: Doctor J 1980-1981, Doctor J 1979-1980, Charles Barkley 1990-1991, Barkley 1987-1988, Dana Barros 1994-1995, Hal Greer 1963-1964, Billy Cunningham 1969-1970

Not honorable mention: anything during the Process years, Jeff Ruland 1986-87, Andrew Bynum 2012-2013

Kevin Kinkead
Kevin Kinkead

Kevin has been writing about Philadelphia sports since 2009. He spent seven years in the CBS 3 sports department and started with the Union during the team's 2010 inaugural season. He went to the academic powerhouses of Boyertown High School and West Virginia University. email - k.kinkead@sportradar.com

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