Philadelphia 76ers: Pair Shake Milton and Tobias Harris with Joel Embiid

The arrival of James Harden has been a revelation for the Philadelphia 76ers, but not every player has benefitted equally from his arrival.

While some, like Tyrese Maxey, Matisse Thybulle, and Georges Niang, have watched their production skyrocket with number 1 on the court, others, most notably Tobias Harris, Furkan Korkmaz, and Shake Milton, have struggled to recapture their footing in a world where Harden commands the ball for much of the contest.

Alarming? On the Taco Bell Hot Sauce Scale, I’d give it a Medium. Despite boasting the second-best lineup in the NBA according to Net Rating, the team has struggled to find winning combinations when either one of their top two players is off the court and has watched former contributors fall off in a big way due to the growing pains of a contracted role.

Fortunately – or not, if you had tickets – the Philadelphia 76ers had to weather a game without both James Harden and Joel Embiid versus the East’s top-seeded team, the Miami Heat, and by had to weather, I obviously mean beat the bricks off of Tyler Herro and company thanks to massive performances by Shake Milton and Furkan Korkmaz, who, it turns out, can still play basketball. With this game film now crucially on tape, Doc Rivers has a golden opportunity to “shake” up his rotation and maybe get some juiced-up action out of his bench after all.

The Philadelphia 76ers need to pair James Harden with compatible players.

How did the Philadelphia 76ers get offense when Tyrese Maxey was off the court in the “Pre-James Harden time?”

I know it feels like a lifetime ago, and in a way, it is, but if you can, think back to just under a month ago, when Embiid was a one-man show and the rest of the offense orbited around his game like planets around the sun. Sure Tyrese Maxey and Tobias Harris routinely got theirs, with the latter largely tasked with running the second unit when Embiid was off the court, but if you look back on the usage rates, you’ll see that Shake Milton and Furkan Korkmaz were much bigger focal points of Doc Rivers’ offense, with the duo routinely running the point when “The Franchise” needed a break on the bench.

Once Harden made his way down I-95 from Brooklyn to South Broad, that was obviously going to change. When any team adds one of the best ISO scorers of an NBA era to their rotation, role players are going to see their, um, roles change, sometimes for the best but often for the worst if their games were predicated on dribbling the ball.

Harris, Korkmaz, and Milton all fall into the latter category and have watched their roles suffer when tasked with filling a catch-and-shoot or even catch-and-cut role off of a pass from Harden. While Harris has weathered Harden’s addition better than his aforementioned teammates, as his two-man Net Rating with Harden is the fourth-best mark on the team behind only Embiid, Maxey, and seemingly his best-fitting friend on the team, Matisse Thybulle, his game has unquestionably taken a hit when Harden is on the court, which, considering he spends 86.6 percent of his minutes per game playing alongside the 10-time All-Star, is most of his playing time.

The same could be said for Milton, the guard most often paired up with Harden when Maxey takes a breather. Since Harden entered the Sixers’ oeuvre, Milton’s minutes have dropped from 24.3 to 13.8, and his points have fallen even further, from a solid 9.9 to a not-so-solid 2.8. While the two-man pairing has still graded out with a positive Net Rating, though just barely at 3.3, what makes Milton special as a ball-in-hand scorer has taken a backseat to Harden’s far more polished offensive game.

The solution? Play Harris and Milton next to Embiid instead of Harden.

I know, crazy, right? If Rivers wants to keep two of his top-four players on the court at all times, why not build the bulk of the non-Embiid minutes around the players Harden fits best with – Thybulle, Maxey, Millsap, and Green according to the NBA’s advanced analytics – and then allow “The Process” to do his thing with Harris and the reserves he fits best alongside, Niang, Korkmaz, and Milton.

What? But those four players are different for each player? Goodness, that’s certainly convenient.

Against all odds, the Philadelphia 76ers found a starting lineup that works. They’ve unleashed Tyrese Maxey, unlocked a whole new level of offense for Matisse Thybulle, and even convinced Tobias Harris to take more open 3s without soaking up the clock with his back to the basket. The next step in really taking the team’s overall efficiency up a notch is to find a way to win the 32-ish minutes a night when the starters are off the court. If James Harden plays best with Matisse Thybulle, Tyrese Maxey, Paul Millsap, and Danny Green, then build the second unit around that quartet. If Joel Embiid, statistically speaking, plays best with Georges Niang, Furkan Korkmaz, Shake Milton, and Isaiah Joe, forge some lineups around those players, too. But after watching an undermanned Sixers squad take out the Miami Heat on their home court, it’s clear there are some former roleplayers who could provide valuable minutes if their usage is reconfigured to better suit their talents.