The Philadelphia 76ers lost their 2019 Eastern Conference semifinal series to the Toronto Raptors well before Kawhi Leonard’s legacy-defining shot from the right corner.
You can point to the 7 minutes and 11 seconds the Sixers went without making a field goal in the fourth quarter of Game 4.
Or, you can point to the depth behind Joel Embiid. Slowed by a knee injury and a stomach illness throughout the series, Embiid’s intangible impact was there even if the box score numbers weren’t. Philadelphia outscored Toronto by 90 points in the 237 minutes Embiid played that that series. In the minutes Embiid was on the bench? Try minus-109. That is, Philadelphia was outscored by 109 points in 99 minutes.
The Sixers, you could very reasonably argue, lost an entire series in the 14 minutes per game in which Embiid was on the bench.
Why bring this up almost three seasons removed from when it happened?
Because that could be where the current Sixers are heading.
In the case of Embiid and his current reliever, the story trends similarly. In the 10 games he has played since DeAndre Jordan took the court, Embiid is only plus-18 in 350 minutes. In the 183 minutes in which Embiid has been off the floor over the last 11 games, Philadelphia is plus-2.
Part of that variance is the MVP favorite is that impactful. The other part, though, is the play of his tag partner.
Jordan is devoid of lateral quickness. That diminished ability means he doesn’t have the versatility to move rapidly from spot to spot. To be a positive contributor, he must rely on anticipatory thinking. The troubling signs are he isn’t doing that well.
Jordan maintains mutual position between the roller and the ball here. Not only does Furkan Korkmaz fight through the screen, but Russell Westbrook is shooting 36% on midrange jumpers this season (35th percentile). So, even mutual positioning against Westbrook is unnecessary. The rim should take priority. The slightest misstep has Jordan out of position, leaving the rim compromised.
Wenyen Gabriel pops here. There’s no high roll necessitating Jordan’s drop. Tyrese Maxey also slides over to tag the roller if he’s there. Malik Monk is an average jump-shooter dribbling off picks this season. Jordan should be granting him more respect than sitting at the elbow.
The foremost concern with Jordan is decision-making, at the rim and in space. Between silly fouls and uninspiring contests at the basket, and poor positioning and choice-toggling outside of the paint, Jordan hasn’t shown many signs of being to the task of what the Sixers need.
Critical is having players capable of containing switches and small-ball lineups in the playoffs. This final stretch of the regular season is a perfect opportunity to see what the younger and more athletic Paul Reed and Charles Bassey can do. But, Rivers has shown no interest in looking that far down his bench.
And it might just be this team’s downfall.
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