Philadelphia Six Players

Last year the Philadelphia Sixers roared to the top of the Eastern Conference, but this season it's been a far more difficult run. With the Sixers mired in sixth place in the East at 12-16, I thought I'd take a look at what's been their downfall.

Those of you who've seen me do this exercise before know where I'm going to start: offensive and defensive efficiency. Here's how the Sixers fare in those two categories last year and this year, with league rankings in parentheses:

         00-01       01-02
Offense  102.8 (12)  96.4 (26)
Defense   97.8  (5)  97.4 (2)

I'd say we've narrowed down the problem. The Sixers are playing defense even better than they were a year ago, which is perhaps not surprising since they've had the benefit of a full year of Dikembe Mutombo. However, their offense has gone from slightly above average to a total abomination (Smart alecks in Atlanta will say that this is also because they've had the benefit of a full year of Dikembe Mutombo, but you'll see below I think there's a different answer).

So what's going on with their offense? Why aren't they scoring as well? One obvious answer is injuries. Philadelphia dropped their first five games with Iverson and McKie on the shelf, Derrick Coleman has missed time (couldn't see that one coming, huh?) and Eric Snow has only recently returned to action.

But I hardly think that's the whole answer. Of their 27 games, Iverson's missed seven games, McKie eight, Coleman five. Snow missed 21, but does anyone think Eric Snow is so valuable that a middle of the pack offense would suddenly turn to garbage in his absence?

Yet, in a strange way, Snow is more valuable this year than you might think. That has nothing to do with him and everything to do with what replaces him. Here's a comparison of Philadelphia's PERs from last year to this year. See if you can find the difference:

           00-01   01-02
Iverson    28.14   23.15
McKie      16.92   19.74
Lynch      12.45   
Harpring           15.30
Hill       11.05
Coleman            15.22
Mutombo    18.51   15.07
Snow       16.05   14.53
Ollie       9.81
Jones      14.24
MacCulloch 14.96
Geiger      6.96
Claxton            10.45
Cummings            6.48
Bell                4.41
Blount              3.59
Ruffin             -0.45

Although Allen Iverson has fallen off quite a bit from his season a year ago, the Sixers uprgraded both forward spots and Aaron McKie is playing better, so when everyone's healthy, they're starting lineup is at least as good as last year's.

It's when everyone's not healthy that the problems start. Last year the Sixers could bring Todd MacCulloch and Jumaine Jones off the bench, or Matt Geiger in a pinch. This year their backup big man rotation of Corie Blount and Michael Ruffin is certainly the worst in the league, and among the worst I have ever seen.

Last year they had McKie, Kevin Ollie and half a season of Toni Kukoc to bring in to the backcourt off the bench. This year they've had the marginally useful Claxton (who now is also injured) and then guys like Vonteego Cummings and Raja Bell, who really aren't quality players.

As you can guess from the title of this piece, their real problem is that they only have six guys who can play: Snow, Iverson, McKie, Mutombo, Harpring and Coleman. The injuries have magnified what an awful bench they have. Here's another look at Philadelphia's record, this time in terms of their Six Players:

All Six Playing   4-3
Five Playing      5-3
Four Playing      3-4
Three Playing     0-5
Two Playing       0-1

Even when all six have been playing, they're not world beaters, because they still have to bring guys beyond the front six off the bench, and besides, they weren't the '72 Lakers or anything a year ago. But when somebody outside their top six has to play a major role, the Sixers don't have a chance. In fact, even the three wins with four of their six playing in the chart above are misleading; one was over the Bulls and one was when their defense held Cleveland to 68 points.

So now that everyone's healthy, what can we expect from the Philadelphia Six Players? Last year's team won 56, but that was sort of a fluke; their expected wins, a stat I'll deal with in a later column, only came out to 51. Also, they had a better bench last year, so we'd expect a slight dropoff from that level.

Taking that as our starting point, let's assume they're a 50 win team when everyone's healthy. That means they'd win about 60 percent of their remaining games, going 33-21 the rest of the way. That would put them at 45 wins to end the season, which will put them comfortably into the playoffs in the East.

But if somebody gets hurt again, all best are off. The Six Players can be a winning team in spite of their bench, but if they're the Four Players they have no chance.

Pot Shots

By the way, you really see the impact of the luxury tax with Philadelphia's big men. They got a cap exception when Matt Geiger retired but ended up eating it rather than signing someone and having to pay luxury tax. The league should take a look at adding a luxury tax exception for teams that are in that kind of bind ...

One of the reasons I came up with game scores is to take a look at a game like Jason Kidd has last night. He went 1 for 11 from the field, but had 18 assists, 4 steals and just one turnover. It's hard for us to process the good and the bad and figure out what kind of night he had, but the game score method shows he was quite valuable - his mark of 14.2 was the Nets' second highest last night, eclipsed only by Kenyon Martin's 17.4 ...

The Bulls are set to announce Bill Cartwright as their new head coach, as apparently Bill Berry needs to get back to the recording studio with Mr. Stipe. I'm fine with them picking Mr. Bill except for one thing: it means we have to hear post-game interviews with the guy. If you've never heard him, here's a good "talk like Bill Cartwright" game you can play at home: Take a hair dryer and run it full blast into your mouth until all the saliva is completely gone. Now, whisper as loud as you possibly can, and keep going on while paying no attention to the people whincing around you, or those that are racing for the water fountain because you've made them vicariously thirsty. Congratulations, you've just talked like Bill Cartwright.

Programming Note

The next column will appear Wednesday, January 2. See ya next year.