Four-for-Four: The Hope Springs Eternal Edition

76ERS

QUIT COMPLAINING

Apparently, there are a lot of members of the Philadelphia media that would prefer that the 76ers continue to draft towards the end of the lottery and field a team barely capable of making the playoffs, let alone hoisting a NBA championship.

As bad as the 76ers have been this season, it is impossible for them to be the worst team in NBA history. Watching them play is a struggle for sure, but this is what we signed up for. Teams like what the Sixers were prior to Sam Hinkie overhauling the roster might as well be invisible in the NBA. Their sole purpose is to make the stars of the league look good and put up a solid effort in a humble defeat. It would appear that, almost 3/4 through the season, there are a lot of people who would actually prefer that.

There’s no guarantee that this plan of Hinkie’s is going to work. It’s a high-risk sequence of events that, should the team project wrong or suffer a setback, could end up costing the 76ers GM his job. There is no one that knows that fact more clearly than Hinkie, though. He was in the middle of the process that turned the Houston Rockets into a title contender and realizes that strides a franchise must take to position themselves in such a situation.

Even if the Sixers were respectable, it would mean nothing at this time in the NBA. LeBron James is dominating the league in a way that is preventing any and all comers from challenging the Heat’s reign. While Miami might not capture their 3rd straight NBA title, it will most certainly take a Herculean effort from the team that does end up beating them. I’m all for respectability, but until the 76ers start increasing their talent level in a big way, they don’t have a prayer at making a run when the window opens back up. So for all of the Philadelphia media complaining about the product on the court when the 76ers play, save it. That is, of course, unless all writers like Dennis Deitch want is for the city to remain without a championship for another 30 years.

STILL…

While I embrace the fact that the 76ers are positioning themselves to improve in the long-term, sometimes they manage to outdo themselves.

In the team’s humiliating loss to the Bucks, the only team with a worse record than Philadelphia, Tony Wroten managed to mess up this layup/dunk/seizure in a way that only a member of the Sixers could. I still hope that the team ends up keeping Wroten beyond this season, but with far less of these catastrophes.

WHAT’S YOUR ANSWER?

With Allen Iverson’s official retirement from professional basketball happening tomorrow night, it made me wonder what my favorite memory of ‘The Answer’ was. CSNPhilly.com has been counting down some of Iverson’s greatest moments as a Sixer, and one entry in particular struck home for me.

Having been fortunate enough to attend this game with a friend, I can still say with 100% honesty that I’ve never seen a more impressive individual effort than the show that A.I. put on against Toronto. Earmarking one of the great playoff series in Philadelphia history, Iverson tied a bow on his MVP award with his 52 point effort in a win. I know me being there has an effect on my perspective of the game, but it confuses me as to how this is CSN’s 10th best Iverson moment.