Somewhere, Sam Hinkie is grinning
ever so slightly. Lady Luck finally looked favorably upon the Sixers at the NBA
Draft Lottery on Tuesday evening in New York City, and suddenly the
organization’s immediate outlook looks a whole lot brighter.
The Sixers, represented by beleaguered
Head Coach Brett Brown, were awarded the first overall pick in the 2016 NBA
Draft, and thus they will finally get
their pick of the litter. The pick represents the team's first top overall
selection since 1996 - when it used the first pick in the deep draft to select
first-ballot Hall-of-Famer Allen Iverson - and third ever.
The top selection is a fitting reward
for a frustrated fan base that has supported the team through three straight
seasons of struggle with the promise of brighter days ahead. Their patience may
have paid off, as the Sixers face the prospect of adding a top-tier,
potentially elite talent to an already young and promising roster. Either Ben
Simmons or Brandon Ingram will serve as an excellent addition for the Sixers as
the team climbs back to contention.
The number one overall selection in
the 2016 NBA Draft may not be the only franchise building block joining the
active roster this summer either. As it stands, all indications are that Joel
Embiid is ready to make his much-delayed debut as well. Embiid has been upping
his on-court activity, and even tweeted out his intentions to contribute on-court next season.
If you remember, Embiid was widely
considered to be the top prospect in the highly-hyped ’14 Draft before injury
issues emerged a week before the draft. In Embiid and either Simmons or Ingram
the Sixers are adding two potentially franchise-caliber talents this summer.
Also potentially joining Embiid on
the ‘finally ready to play for the Sixers’ list is fellow ’14 lottery pick
Dario Saric, who has been seasoning overseas since his selection by the Sixers
two years ago. Saric is one of the best-regarded young international prospects
in the world, and could add another interesting element to the Sixers squad as
a multi-faceted forward.
The team’s ample cap space and
financial flexibility needs to be taken into account as well, as the Sixers
will have the means to pursue virtually any free agent(s) they want to
complement their core, and ample ammo for potential trades. The addition of new
top-tier talent will shift talented yet overly-relied upon players like Robert
Covington and Jerami Grant to the position of role-player, in turn greatly
bolstering the team’s depth.
All of Sam Hinkie’s puzzle pieces seem
to be falling into place – albeit with him no longer in the picture – to form a
promising picture.
An underrated aspect of Hinkie’s work
is the consistent influx of talent down the road as well. Many pundits have
proclaimed that “the process” culminated with landing the top pick in the draft
at Tuesday’s lottery, but the truth is that the process is far from done. The
Sixers still have rights to the Lakers pick – which is again top-three
protected in ’17, and then unprotected in ’18 – and the pick swap with the
Kings, who will likely land in the lottery again.
So while the Sixers have a solid
asset base already assembled, there is still more talent to be had. In a
particularly weak Eastern Conference, it is not unrealistic
to think that the Sixers could contend in the near future, once some of the
younger gain some experience. Sam Hinkie was able to fortify the franchise’s
foundation without mortgaging the future, and right now that future is looking
pretty bright.
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