Philadelphia 76ers: Shake Milton can help more by doing less

After stringing off a series of impressive, often lopsided wins, the Philadelphia 76ers have hit a bit of a tough spot as of late.

Now granted, it’s hard to get too worked up about how the Sixers are playing without three-fifths of their starting lineup. Any team trying to replace 45-ish points per game by bumping up bench players is going to struggle, especially when it’s not even the same three players that are absent, but there have been some startling developments as of late that Doc Rivers would be wise to nip in the bud now before they blossom into full-on bad habits.

The worst culprit? Shake Milton, who arguably turned in his worst performance of the season in the Sixers’ 116-113 loss to the Pheonix Suns.

Sure, some will point to the team’s lack of outside shooting, George Hill‘s slow start, or Mike Scott‘s non-existent statistical contributions as more pressing issues than a player averaging 13.4 points per game, but when the Philadelphia 76ers have needed him most, Milton’s efficiency has somehow flown out the window in favor of 12.5 turnover percentage and a sub-46 shooting percentage.

Needless to say, that’s not a sustainable strategy for success, especially with an incredibly challenging three-game road trip waiting just over the horizon.

Shake Milton needs to simplify his game to help the Philadelphia 76ers.

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Shake Milton is a shooting guard.

While he has played point guard at times and has turned in some incredible performances while predominantly logging minutes at the one, Milton’s really not built to be a high-usage facilitator who can run an offense.

Mind you, that isn’t necessarily a bad thing. Milton’s counterpart in the Philadelphia 76ers’ contest against the Pheonix Suns, Devin Booker, has been moved on and off the ball a number of times during his professional career and is currently in the middle of a really good campaign paired up with future Hall of Famer Chris Paul.

If Milton had a point guard to play off of regularly of the same caliber as Paul – see Simmons, Ben – maybe he too would be able to relax, focus up, and play his role to the best of his ability, but when Simmons is out, and the Sixers put the ball in his hands with more regularity, the third-year guard out of SMU tried to take Marc Zumoff‘s “turn garbage into gold” catchphrase a bit too literally.

Despite having played 777 minutes through the first 57 games of the 2020-21 NBA season with either Tyrese Maxey or Simmons, Milton has the second-highest usage rate (24.9) of any player on the team behind only Joel Embiid. Now theoretically, that shouldn’t matter one way or another. Usage rate doesn’t define a player’s impact or quantify their efficiency; it just highlights how often any given player is involved in a play, with 20 percent being average as per Bleacher Report.

A 24.9 usage rate signifies that Milton is touching the ball on pretty much every possession, which you’d expect from a point guard but isn’t ideal for a shooting guard. Seth Curry, for example, has a usage rate of 17.4, and he averages near-identical assist totals to Milton.

My advice? Chill.

Part of the reason why the Sixers drafted Maxey and then traded for George Hill – besides both moves being of good value – is because they are both good facilitators with experience playing alongside scoring combo guards. Pairing either player up with Milton – or Simmons, for that matter – could divvy up the on-ball responsibilities more evenly and add some movement to Doc Rivers’ offense. Had that actually happened, maybe Milton wouldn’t be in the middle of his least-efficient professional season, but unfortunately, that hasn’t been the case.

No, too often have we seen Maxey – who isn’t a particularly good outside shooter – waiting on the wings while Milton dribbles around trying to find a seam in a defense that knows what’s coming.

Moving forward, that needs to change.

As counter-intuitive as it may sound, Rivers would be wise to give Milton fewer responsibilities moving forward in the hopes of settling down his young guard and rebuilding his confidence over the final month of the season. Maybe a “promotion” to the starting lineup where dominating the ball becomes a whole lot harder when paired up with Simmons and Embiid could chill out Milton’s burning need to do more and allow him to ease back into more of a complementary role.

Alternatively, Rivers could fully hand the keys over to Hill and allow the veteran point guard to provide a calming presence to Philly’s second unit. If Milton and Hill can trade-off possessions or even run a pass-heavy two-man game anchored by Dwight Howard, it’ll make the Sixers’ bench unit all the more explosive and potentially tire out an opposing defense a la a strong running game in football.

Heck, Maxey has been playing some of the best basketball of his young career as of late; why not let him run the show with Milton serving as a spot-up shooter on the wings? Milton was the Sixers’ most efficient 3 point shooter last season and could surely become it again with a few more off-ball open looks per game.

Either way, getting zero points out of Milton in the second half can’t become the new norm.

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Any NBA season, especially one with a consensed schedule, is a marathon, not a sprint. Players will get hot for a bit, go cold for a bit, and ultimately even out if the season is looked at as a whole. Maybe Shake Milton is trying to force things because his shots aren’t falling as often as usual, or he’s simply trying to do too much because he really wants to win even when his team is down a starter or three. Either way, the Philadelphia 76ers would be wise to find a way to better utilize Milton moving forward, as he hasn’t quite excelled in the Lou Williams-esque walking bucket some expected coming into the season.