The Philadelphia 76ers are having some issues trying to figure out their awkward roster and seeing how it all fits together, but make no mistake that their roster is built for the playoffs and their opponents know it.
When they went out and signed Al Horford in free agency, they did so with the playoffs in mind. The hope is that Horford and Joel Embiid will form a fearsome duo down low and help make the Sixers one of the best defensive teams in the league.
They have had their issues offensively as they are going against the current NBA trend of playing small ball and that has some questioning whether the Sixers made the right move of bringing in the big man.
If you ask Brooklyn Nets coach Kenny Atkinson, he sees things eventually working out in Philadelphia.
“I think, much like us, with the new configuration,” he said on Wednesday before the team’s matched up in Philadelphia. “No Jimmy Butler, no (JJ) Redick, that’s like a completely different, that’s a big-time change. So the fact that they’re having some starts and stops with that is, you could argue ‘Why aren’t they like 27th in offensive efficiency?’ like the fact they’re trying to figure it out and they’re getting better and Al can play the 4, he’s a mismatch problem at the 5.”
To Atkinson’s point, the Sixers entered their matchup on Wednesday ranked 17th in the league in offensive rating before scoring 117 points in a win over Brooklyn. Horford had a stat line of 14 points, eight rebounds, and six assists that was more Horford-like, but he shot only 4-for-14 including 2-for-9 from deep.
There are clearly kinks to continue to work out, but Atkinson, who coached Horford while he was an assistant with the Atlanta Hawks, has no doubt in his mind that it will all work out.
“I think Brett’s (Brown) talked about it, but once the playoffs come, that’s a nice problem to have that they can go either way,” he added. “I think it’ll be a big matchup problem, but I think Al is trying to figure out a new team and one thing about Al is he’s smart, he’s an excellent player, he’s going to figure it out and you’ll see at the end of the year he’ll be playing great basketball and he’ll fit in just fine here.”
The Sixers will have some more work to do once Embiid returns from his hand injury as they will have to still figure out how the two big men will work together, but having two talented bigs such as these two is a nice problem to have. It’s always better to have more talent than not enough talent. [lawrence-related id=23592,23575,23576]