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Joel Embiid’s Return a Reminder of the Sharp Duality in Sixers’ Offensive Identity
By Matt Schultz
Published:
For Sixers fans who’ve been along for the ride throughout the Process Era, seeing Joel Embiid suited up on Sunday night was a pretty nice thing. He looked happy. He was doing hip thrusts in the player announcements. He had the Sixers’ first eight points. Things were good for a moment there –
But the good vibes died out pretty quickly. Boston went on to win the game in a rout. It was never really competitive. The Sixers were outrebounded by 21. Payton Pritchard embarrassed the Sixers’ defense with a game-high 32 off the bench. The whole thing was bad, and it solidified in my mind that the ceiling for this team simply is not very high. And the biggest bummer of all may be that this is how things are going to stay for the foreseeable future.
After going down 3-1 in a series, it’s natural to zoom out and become existential about your sub-par team – to sit and ponder on where it is currently and where it can go next season and beyond. I’ve been wracking my brain all morning for ways to fix the Sixers. Fire Nick Nurse? Sure, why not. Fire Daryl Morey? Okay, sure, could be fun to get a new guy in here. Make the Sixers’ black 2001 jerseys the only ones the team ever wears? Yes. They are the best jersey in the NBA. These are all good ideas. Clean house. A fresh start…
But ultimately, none of those moves will make much of a difference. The problem with this team is that when he’s healthy enough to play, Joel Embiid is still the Sixers’ best player – and that means that when he’s on the floor, the Sixers’ best bet is to play through him. Unfortunately, though, playing through Joel is antithetical to the way Tyrese Maxey and VJ Edgcombe thrive.
The Sixers currently have two incompatible identities. The result… is purgatory.
Game 4 showed us just that. With his return, the offense ran through Joel in the same way it always does: The emphasis is on Embiid slowing the game down in the halfcourt. He gets the ball in the post or at the nail/elbow and faces up, does a few jab steps, then usually settles for a eighteen-footer without jumping. And insanely, even a couple weeks after surgery, he’s still good enough to make this an efficient way to play! He finished the evening with 26 points on 9-for-21 shooting! Pretty good!
The problem, though, is that he’s not good enough anymore for this action to buoy the Sixers to wins. The result is just a good-but-not-great stat line that isn’t enough to beat good opponents, all while negating Maxey and VJ’s most elite weapon (speed) and shrinking their roles into off-the-catch shooters and cutters. Or, even worse, the offense succumbs to your-turn-my-turn shot-taking. Everyone’s out of rhythm, there is no flow, there are no easy, bread-and-butter looks – and that’s exactly what we saw: VJ finished Game 4 with 6 points on 2-for-9 shooting from the field. Tyrese Maxey had three FG attempts in the first half! Not good! –
“That can’t happen. That’s unacceptable. That’s on me. I take full responsibility on that one.”
Compare this performance to the Sixers’ Game 2 without Joel and it’s night and day. In Philly’s only win of the series, the young backcourt was able to beat the Celtics with their explosiveness. Maxey scored 29 points on 11-for-28 shooting. Edgecombe had his best game of the series, scoring 30 on a 12-20 mark with 10 rebounds. And the eye test said even more! It looked like a completely different team… because it was! And sadly, I don’t see a way to play that way with Joel in the lineup.
Embiid is too slow to get out in transition. He’s not a good enough shooter to space the floor in the halfcourt for the young guards to attack. He’s never primarily been a screener and roller, and now that he’s older and perennially hurt, this is pretty much off the table. Playing a two-man game with Maxey as the ballhandler worked a few times in Game 4 – maybe the Sixers just spam a pick-and-pop with Joel as the screener every time down the floor? Can the Sixers run this one thousand times in a game? Is that what “Maxey Needs To Run The Offense” believers want? I don’t see it!
I’m not happy about it, but, in my opinion, Game 4 showed us that the Sixers still go as Joel goes: not very far, and deeply unpleasant to watch the whole way through.
Matt Schultz is a comedy and sports writer from Philadelphia. He’s written extensively for ClickHole, The Onion, and Conan O’Brien’s Team Coco. His work has been featured in Vulture, Deadspin, The A.V. Club, Paste Magazine, and other publications. Much of his sports journalism can be found on college basketball websites that don’t exist anymore (PhilaHoops Heads rise up…)