It’s too early to say if the 76ers are for real — but not too early to enjoy the surprisingly great vibes

There are four unbeaten teams remaining in the NBA. One of them is the Philadelphia 76ers. That is an unexpected thing to write.

It’s early, of course. The new season is barely a week old. The standings this early can tell lies. But on its face it’s true. Right there at the top of the Eastern Conference. Winners of their first four. Their best start in six seasons since they went 5-0 to begin the 2019-20 campaign. The Sixers, of all teams. 

It has been a long time since the Sixers have led the league in anything aside from drama. For well over a decade now they’ve been the Sideshow Bobs of basketball, stepping on rakes at every turn. They went into last season with hopes of finally getting out of the second round of the playoffs, something they haven’t accomplished since Allen Iverson took the team to the NBA Finals way back in 2001. Naturally they crashed out in spectacular fashion instead. Joel Embiid played 19 games. Paul George — whom they signed to a max free agent contract coming off a career year with the Clippers — regressed mightily at both ends of the floor. He played 41 games. And Tyrese Maxey, their speedy blur of a guard, made it through 52 games before he too was shut down in a late-season backdoor tanking effort that was necessary but hardly subtle. The team won just 24 games. Even by their standards it was a fantastic failure.

And now here they are without a loss. In the interest of context and accuracy it should be noted that their four wins came against the Celtics, Hornets, Magic and Wizards. On the whole, not the stiffest competition. They trailed by double digits in the fourth quarter in two of those outings and they were down 19 to Washington in the second half before mounting massive comebacks in all three. They also needed overtime to beat the Wizards, which is not exactly a flex.

What to make of something like that and a team like this? After beating the Wizards this week, the question was put to Maxey. He said their hot start and come-from-behind wins “says that we’re tough” and “resilient.” Maybe he’s right. But is their start real and is their style of play sustainable? Or is it merely another Sixers mirage from an organization that’s been wandering the basketball desert for decades?

What’s going right?

We’ll start with what has worked so far. The Sixers are second in offensive rating and feature the league’s top scorer in Maxey, who’s averaging a healthy 37.5 points (along with 8.3 assists). The backcourt pairing with him and rookie VJ Edgecombe has been dynamite — two explosive athletes that put serious pressure on opposing defenses.

Edgecombe is averaging 22.3 points, 5.8 rebounds, 5.5 assists and 1.5 steals with a 55.7 eFG. He has wildly exceeded all reasonable expectations when they drafted him. Their best three-man combos feature some combination of those two guys. Kelly Oubre, Quentin Grimes, and Edgecombe are plus-47 in 56 minutes. Edgecombe, Maxey and Grimes are +46 in 66 minutes. (By contrast the Maxey, Edgecombe, Joel Embiid units are minus-20 in 48 minutes.) Compared to previous seasons when everything understandably went through Embiid, the Sixers have been pretty comfortable handing the keys to their young speedy backcourt and letting them mash the offensive gas pedal. It’s an understandable strategy given they have several talented guards and wings, a unit that will get an added boost when sophomore sharp shooter Jared McCain returns from a thumb injury.

As entertaining as it has been to watch them fly up and down the court and score 129.3 points per game, there are consequences to playing that way. Primarily, they haven’t been able to stop anyone. Only the Suns and Nets have worse defensive ratings. That is company you don’t want to keep. The Sixers are fast and athletic for the most part but their best players outside of Embiid are also small, which has created no shortage of matchup problems. 

“You’ve got to play some semblance of defense,” head coach Nick Nurse told the media this week, “no matter what the matchups are, whether you are big or small, quick or slow, or whatever. You’ve got to figure some things out.”

What does it mean for Embiid and George?

And here we turn to two of their bigger and older players, who also happen to be their most expensive. Embiid has begun the season on a minutes restriction and won’t play back-to-backs. The 31-year-old looked slow and broken in the opener against the Celtics. But against the Hornets he scored 20 points in 20 minutes, and he followed that up with 25 points, seven rebounds, five assists and a block in 23 minutes against the Wizards. How many games he plays this season and how many minutes he can log in those games will go a long way toward determining how successful the Sixers can be. If Maxey and Edgecombe keep terrorizing the opposition, they probably don’t need the former MVP to play like one again — but they do need him to contribute. Averaging a point a minute, as he did against Charlotte and Washington, is a good start, even when those minutes are limited. 

George is perhaps even trickier, which given Embiid’s lengthy injury history is saying something. The 34-year-old is dealing with a knee injury and it’s unclear when he’ll return. On paper, adding someone who is 6-foot-8, 220 pounds and made All-Defense four times and All -NBA six times would address the glaring hole they have at power forward. Except any PG-related paper was wadded up and tossed in the trash can last season. After posting career-highs in field-goal and 3-point percentages in his final season with the Clippers, George shot just 43% from the floor and 35.8% from deep. Worse, for the first time in his career he looked uninterested and overmatched at times on defense. In his absence the Sixers have gone with a rotating cast of replacement-level players: Dominick Barlow, Justin Edwards and Jabari Walker. None of them are the solution to the Sixers’ frontcourt problem. 

PG might not be either. Even if he’s eventually healthy, what does he have left? He’ll be 35 in May. In the limited time that we saw Maxey, Embiid and George on the court together last season, the takeaway wasn’t overly encouraging. In 294 minutes the trio was plus-2. They went 7-8 in those games. 

Maybe because the way they want to play this season appears to be a different approach from last season, anything they get from George is a plus. If they get anything at all. There’s a not insignificant portion of the fan base that would prefer he just does his podcast instead of playing basketball for the Sixers. Those same people would be overjoyed if he was traded, but considering he has one of the worst contracts in the league relative to his production — he’s owed more than $150 million over the remaining three years, with a player option on the back end — he’s not going anywhere.

While we’re on the topic of how people perceive this team and the attendant vibes, the early returns have been pretty positive. As a native Philadelphian who has watched the Sixers my whole life and covered them for various city and national media outlets, I can tell you that that reaction has been … unusual. Generally bringing up the subject of the Sixers elicits groans and eye rolls from the Philly faithful. Not these days. These days the vibes are surprisingly good. 

I’m not sure anyone thinks they’ll keep winning at a clip that positions them as actual top-tier title contenders in the Eastern Conference, but it is possible to tilt your head at the right angle and imagine them at least remaining relevant. For now, the one thing you can say about them for certain is they have an exciting young backcourt and the overall product has been enjoyable. That’s not nothing.