Sixers' season seems lost, so now what? Plus, scouting Michigan State's Jase Richardson

PHILADELPHIA — The Philadelphia 76ers had the best win of their season Friday, but even amid a rousing victory, signs of the despair underlying the rest of their season were never too far away.

One particular scene from the second quarter stood out. Having already committed three first-half turnovers, the Sixers’ Paul George took a couple of slow dribbles toward the baseline, spun out of a trap and zipped a pass crosscourt … 10 feet over his intended recipient’s head and into the seats.

Boobirds, rarely an endangered species in Philly even in the best of times, began breaking into song as another long night in Philly’s already-long season seemed imminent. But for one weekend, at least, the Sixers managed to flip that script. George rebounded from that miscue and a slow first half to rack up 30 points in the Sixers’ rousing win over the mighty Cleveland Cavaliers. The next night, even with George playing just 12 minutes and star center Joel Embiid out once again, Philly earned a crucial win against the Chicago Bulls to keep pace in the, um, “race” for 10th place in the Eastern Conference.

Those boobirds aimed at George, however, didn’t emerge from thin air. They underscored the fact that the disappointment in Philly goes much deeper than just Embiid’s persistent unavailability. Up and down the roster, nearly everyone has underachieved during the Sixers’ 17-27 start.

Perhaps it’s unfair to center those frustrations on George, the 34-year-old nine-time All-Star who signed a max contract with the Sixers in the offseason. Several of his teammates have disappointed as badly or worse. However, George’s middling play — averaging 17.1 points with a 15.7 PER in his 30 games — symbolizes their struggle as succinctly as anyone’s. The whole point of signing a player like George, and pairing him with All-Star guard Tyrese Maxey, was to make the Sixers potent enough to survive the chunk of regular-season games that Embiid would surely miss.

Thus far, that hasn’t happened: The Sixers, who were 16-27 without Embiid a season ago, are just 10-21 in the 31 games he’s missed this year. Those struggles, in turn, underscore the big question staring Philly in the mirror, one that also is on the lips of fans in places like Phoenix, Minnesota and Los Angeles: What’s a team to do when it is pot committed to Plan A … and Plan A doesn’t work?

The Sixers are locked in on their three stars for at least three years beyond this one, and it could be a looooong three years if Daryl Morey’s front office can’t pull some rabbits out of hats. Embiid’s persistent knee problems, combined with the fact that he still has four years and $248 million left on his recently extended deal, paint a gloomy picture; it’s tough to recover from $60 million in dead money on the cap.

George will be on his own max deal until he’s 37, and Maxey’s “low” max deal on a rookie extension still pays him $168 million through 2029. Those three deals essentially tie the Sixers’ hands with the cap through 2028; the Sixers retain some degree of flexibility around them, but they’ll be fighting the tax aprons every year.

Further down the roster, even the brief snippets of good news have come with asterisks: Rookie find Jared McCain is out for the season after knee surgery, while minimum-contract reclamation project Guerschon Yabusele will be an unrestricted free agent after the season with no Bird rights.

Wait, it gets worse. Tanking isn’t a magic bullet either, not with a top-six protected pick owed to the Oklahoma City Thunder from salary-dumping Al Horford in the 2020 offseason. Our David Aldridge recently reported that the Sixers have no intention of tanking, nor does it make any sense at this point. For starters, Philly is tied with Chicago in the loss column after Saturday’s win. Finishing ahead of the Bulls and 10th in the East gets the Sixers into the “So you’re telling me there’s a chance” territory of the Play-In Tournament, especially if Embiid is ready and rolling in April.

On the flip side, the Sixers would need to clinch a bottom-two record to guarantee keeping the pick. They could lose every game the rest of the way and still not get there, not with teams like the Washington Wizards and Utah Jazz racing to the bottom.

Lucking into a top-four pick via the draft lottery would be swell, obviously, but the flattened lottery odds have changed the incentives here. For a team like Philly, there isn’t that big a difference between trying and failing (the Sixers currently have the league’s eighth-worst record) and trying at failing (even a sustained tanking effort would likely only get them the fifth-worst record at this point; too many other teams have lower winning percentages and higher humiliation thresholds).

Do the math: Embracing a full tank to go from eighth-worst to fifth-worst changes the odds of a top-four pick from 26 percent to 42 percent. It’s not worth intentionally torpedoing the season for that. (Besides, many in Philly would argue, Embiid is doing a fine job of that on his own.)

That doesn’t mean some roster moves aren’t imminent. For starters, the Sixers are nearly $11 million over the luxury tax line. It’s Josh Harris’ money, not mine, but can Philly spend like that on this lost season when the repeater tax looms in future seasons with this “three-max” structure? On the other hand, the Sixers also are in an unusual, opportunistic situation to be buyers for next year if the right piece becomes available: Thanks to the James Harden trade with the LA Clippers, the Sixers have an unprotected Clippers first-round pick in 2028 to dangle in the trade market.

While there are limited places to dump money, and still half a season left to play, one wonders if the Sixers would cash in their stock on a player like Yabusele, who might be difficult to re-sign, or give up a second-round pick to drop little-used reserves like Reggie Jackson and Kenyon Martin Jr. (owed $8 million on a contract originally designed to be a midseason trade chip).

Looking ahead, one can talk with more optimism about next year if Embiid is in any kind of reasonable health. McCain will be back, the Sixers likely can use most or all of their nontaxpayer midlevel exception in the summer to get a badly needed jolt of wing athleticism and they’ll likely promote promising two-way Justin Edwards (more on him below).

At the end of the day, however, all of those maneuvers are essentially working around the edges of the main issue, which is that Philly has three players on max deals and only one of them (Maxey) is delivering anything near max value.

Are the Sixers now just the East Coast version of Kawhi Leonard’s Clippers, bravely forging ahead while working the margins around an old, expensive team and constantly injured centerpieces? And if so, is there a more disruptive solution available, such as finding a way to turn George and that Clippers pick into a co-star still in his prime?

Maneuvers of that magnitude are likely only the dreams of Reddit Rembrandts until the Sixers get more definitive information on Embiid. They’ll have it, presumably, by the end of the season, but with less than two weeks left until the Feb. 6 trade deadline, this isn’t the time to go reaching for the dynamite. Instead, hunker down for an odd, awkward dance to the offseason, where much tougher decisions await if Embiid can’t provide a few rays of hope this spring.

Rookie of the Week: Justin Edwards, 6-6 SF, Philadelphia

The Sixers’ undrafted two-way forward caught my attention with a 15-point performance in the win over Cleveland, one that merited his presence on the court during crunchtime after Kelly Oubre Jr. fouled out. After hardly playing the first two months of the season, the southpaw has played at least 20 minutes in the Sixers’ last eight games.

Thus far, he’s shown he can be a solid NBA role player because he checks the right size and skill boxes. Edwards hasn’t needed outlier shooting — he’s only at 34.5 percent from 3 — to put up respectable overall numbers because he can score around the basket (64.7 percent on 2s) and holds his own well enough in other respects to not take anything off the table. Edwards also had a 17-game sample in the G League where he showed similar steady-not-spectacular traits, notably shooting 38.1 percent from 3 on 118 attempts.

Here’s a strong left-handed drive against a closeout from the Cleveland game, for instance:

JE to the hoop! pic.twitter.com/V2X6Ube3qm

— Philadelphia 76ers (@sixers) January 25, 2025

The 21-year-old forward’s emergence hasn’t been a complete surprise if you track back a year or more. Edwards was badly overhyped entering Kentucky in 2023, where he was discussed as a high lottery pick. However, the pendulum likely swung too far in the other direction when an underwhelming freshman year caused him to fall out of the 2024 draft entirely (I maintained a late first-round grade on him).

Sixers coach Nick Nurse noted before Friday’s game that Edwards made a strong impression in training camp after an underwhelming eight-game summer-league stint.

“I thought he started finishing at the rim a lot better and understanding a little more of the NBA game,” Nurse said. “He’s got a pretty good understanding of how to play; he knows how to find the open areas where the ball can find him.”

After Friday’s win, Nurse again complimented Edwards’ off-ball offensive instincts.

“I feel like a broken record, but he just seems to always be in the right place on offense,” Nurse said. “He’s got a few levels, he can go all the way to the rim, he’s got enough of a pull-up if there’s too much traffic there, and he’s got a decent sense (of when) to (kick) it out.”

You’d like to see Edwards keep developing in a few areas — becoming a better one-foot finisher and a more instinctive passer, for instance — but as a young-ish rookie, he’s already playable. Even if he hits as a back-end rotation player, it’s a win for the Sixers given the scarcity of wings with his size profile and the fact he cost them nothing.

Currently on a two-way, Edwards seems a likely candidate for promotion to the 15-man roster after the trade deadline. The Sixers have already used their room-exception money on Oubre but could sign Edwards to a two-year deal with a team option for 2025-26. That would allow them to decline the option this summer and re-sign him with Bird rights to a longer deal, with his restricted status offering protection from potential poachers.

Prospect of the week, Jase Richardson, 6-3 Fr. SG, Michigan State

This name may sound familiar to Spartan fans of a certain age, as Richardson is the son of former Michigan State and 13-year NBA pro Jason Richardson. While Jase Richardson has a different physical profile — he’s left-handed, less filled out through the shoulders and isn’t going to win any dunk contests — he’s likely to follow his father’s footsteps into the pros as an off-ball threat at shooting guard.

Jase Richardson dribbles past Ohio State’s Bruce Thornton during a Big Ten matchup earlier this month. (Joseph Maiorana / Imagn Images)

I caught the younger Richardson in person for the second time this year when I saw his squad play Rutgers on Saturday in Madison Square Garden as the undercard to that night’s New York Knicks-Sacramento Kings game. Richardson finished with 20 points off the bench in the Spartans’ win, and that wasn’t an outlier performance (he continues to come off the bench despite arguably being the team’s best player).

Richardson’s statistical profile is an odd bird for a player of this ilk. Despite playing off the ball and mostly lurking in the corners or coming off curls, he has taken bizarrely few 3-point shots. However, he gets out in transition and is very effective if he gets downhill going left, shooting 63.9 percent on 2s and 85 percent from the line.

Watching him catch-and-shoot before the game, his stroke isn’t going to be a problem, even if there’s a little bit of extra finger action that sends some of his deliveries spinning off-axis. He has a nice arc and a repeatable motion. The bigger issue is whether his size and relative lack of wiggle will allow him to be a volume launcher at the NBA level.

Richardson has been one of the country’s most productive freshmen, but scouts will flag his size and extreme left-handedness as issues for the next level. He might only measure 6-foot-2 in socks at the draft combine, and he’s definitely not a point guard because of the lack of a right hand.

Going through his Synergy clips from the game, I counted two right-hand dribbles all night (there were a few others in less consequential situations, but all the action was going left), mixed in with some clear missed opportunities to exploit a lane to his right.

This worked out, but it’s probably not the ideal way to break a press: 

Just go to the right and past the bigger, slower guy!

Nonetheless, Richardson’s bottom-line production at his age is difficult to dismiss. We don’t have to look back too far in history for comps. The previously mentioned McCain, for instance, was drafted 16th by Philadelphia with a similar profile as an undersized shooting guard with a potent stroke and was one of the league’s top rookies before his season-ending injury.

Teams will be watching Richardson more closely in the second half of the season now that he’s emerged as a likely one-and-done, but if he can continue producing in the grueling (and newly bi-coastal!) Big Ten, he should be a top-20 pick come June.

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(Top photo of Paul George: Harry How / Getty Images)