Four Reasons Not To Worry About The Sixers' Recent Skid
I still find myself relatively optimistic about where this team stands heading into the home stretch of the season.
Mike O’Connor is the best O’Connor in basketball writing. Previously of The Athletic, you can find Mike on Twitter @MOConnor_NBA. Mike’s writing is brought to you by Body Bio, supplements based on science, focusing on your gut and brain health. Get 20% off E-Lyte, Gut+, and all Body Bio products with promo code RTRS20 at Body Bio’s website.
After being on top of the world a couple weeks ago, the Sixers underwent a strange and disappointing stretch of several games that featured injuries to Harden and Embiid, subpar defensive showings, and unmistakably strange vibes. While this was indeed a letdown from where things stood after that 8-game winning streak, I still find myself relatively optimistic about where this team stands heading into the home stretch of the season.
The East vs. West discrepancy
At the time of this publishing, the Sixers ranked 5th in the league in defensive rating against Eastern Conference teams, and 18th in defensive rating against Western Conference teams, per NBA.com. Essentially, they guard Eastern Conference teams at an elite level, and Western Conference teams at a subpar level.
One reason for that, which has been evident so far in these past several games, is the fact that the West has a higher number of lights-out pull-up shooting guards (Curry, Lillard, Irving, Booker, etc.) that force Joel Embiid to guard them at the level of the screen, thus taking him away from the rim, and forcing the Sixers’ defense to scramble behind him.
Where the Sixers fare much better is against teams that allow Embiid to drop back into the paint, not have to chase guards around on the perimeter, and have more of a set defense that isn’t always in scramble mode. This dynamic bodes well for potential matchups against Boston or Milwaukee, who are generally more predictable on offense, and, between the two of them, only have one player who shoots a high volume of pull-up 3s – that being Jayson Tatum, who does so at a relatively poor efficiency.
Against those Eastern Conference juggernauts – and even against lower level, potential first round opponents like Miami and Brooklyn – Embiid will not have to do a lot of work on the perimeter and the Sixers can funnel their entire defense towards meeting Embiid at the rim.
Against teams like Dallas, Denver, Golden State, or Phoenix, the Sixers are forced to defend a lot more off-ball movement, which will expose the holes in their defense, as we saw throughout this recent stretch. But until the NBA Finals, I don’t find myself overly concerned about the Sixers’ defense come playoff time. As long as they’re transition defense is operating at a decent level, they match up with Boston and Milwaukee just fine.
The 3 vs. 6 matchup vs. Brooklyn is an ideal seeding breakdown
While home court advantage in the second round would’ve been nice, I don’t find myself at all disappointed with how the standings are shaking out in the Eastern Conference.
At the time of this publishing, it looks very likely that the Sixers will end up with the No. 3 seed in the East, given the distance between them and Boston, and them and Cleveland, for the second and fourth seeds respectively.
As far as their first round matchup goes, it looks increasingly likely that it will be Brooklyn, given that they are two games ahead of Miami in the loss column, have an easier remaining schedule, and also hold the head-to-head tiebreaker. Personally, I don’t care how strange Miami’s season has been – leaving them for the Celtics to face in round one is a way, way better outcome than facing this newly put together Brooklyn team.
Brooklyn is just frisky enough to provide a solid tune-up for the second round while not actually threatening to win the series. The Nets’ defense, both from a personnel and a schematic standpoint, is quite similar to Boston’s – a whole bunch of switchable wings anchored by undersized, but athletic big men. I would expect them to do quite a bit of switching, as Boston figures to, as well. They are an excellent warmup for the matchup against Boston.
I certainly think the Sixers would beat the Heat as well, but it’s much preferable to face Brooklyn and let Boston have the rock fight with Miami. That alone helps offset some of the disappointment of not having home court advantage.
Every contender has gone through rough patches
This season, every contender in either conference has undergone a meaningful stretch in which they looked completely and totally lost. The Celtics went 13-10 in a 23 game stretch and many expected them to fall to the No. 3 seed. Denver recently lost four games in a row to bad teams, and all of their best players looked sluggish and injured. The Bucks went 8-7 in December and looked like a trainwreck on offense.
And now, it’s the Sixers’ turn – they are experiencing their first real adversity since November. You would’ve been foolish to write off any of those teams then, and you’d be foolish to write off the Sixers now.
What’s more, unlike Boston or Denver, much of the Sixers’ recent issues can be written off to missing their best players. I have very little doubt that as long as the Sixers can regain their health, they belong in the top tier of contenders. We have seen what this team is at its best, and they have proven they can beat any team in the league.
The East could very well be decided by which team is healthiest come playoff time. Boston, in my opinion, still has the best roster, but Robert Williams misses half their games, Marcus Smart is banged up, and Grant Williams hasn’t looked right for most of the past few months. With their current health situation, I would pick a healthy Sixers team over them in the second round with a fair bit of confidence.
With Milwaukee, the health of Khris Middleton looms large, but their roster is full of players with long injury histories outside of Giannis. These three teams are close enough to the point that a single nagging injury can determine the fate of the East.
The backup center situation has never been better
One of the things that should perhaps give a sense of increased confidence in the Sixers is that their eternal achilles heel in the playoffs – the backup center minutes – continues to look like it’s in the best shape it’s been in during the Embiid era.*
*not counting the Al Horford year, I will never acknowledge the existence of his Sixers tenure.
Not only has Paul Reed continued to play excellent basketball, but Dewayne Dedmon has been a bit of a pleasant surprise as a third-string center – we can safely say that he is nowhere near a Deandre Jordan or Greg Monroe-level saboteur. If he has to play five minutes in a playoff game due to injury or foul trouble, that’s not a disaster. And, of course, the Sixers now also have the option of playing P.J. Tucker at the five whenever necessary.
With three decent options, I’m not expecting to see any on/off splits of the level of Embiid in the 2019 Raptors series. And, if the Sixers can avoid getting obliterated when Embiid sits, that’s a level of security that they have not had in years past.