PODCAST: Talking all things NBA, including next dynasty: Sixers

Everyone is focused on the NBA Finals, and with good reason. But there are 28 other teams in the NBA, each with a plan to get where the Cavs and Warriors are right now.

And if I told you the Sixers had the best plan of them all, would you believe me? Vinny DelNegro and Joel Meyers of Sirius XM NBA Radio were skeptical when the subject came up in the radio interview you can listen to below, especially when I said that a decade from now we’ll be taking about a dynasty in Philly.

A dynasty?

Well, yes.

And as I told DelNegro when he questioned my prediction, it will not take a decade for the Sixers to be contending for championships. It’ll take five years — maybe less. And that is why 10 years from now, we’ll be talking dynasty. It’s what happens in years 6-10 that’ll move the discussion to that level.

Why?

Everyone likes to poke fun at Sam Hinkie these days, calling him the best tank driver since Michael Dukakis. But remember something: They used to say similar things about Sam Presti, especially when he arrived in Seattle to take over the SuperSonics and promptly ridded the team of its two best players, Ray Allen and Rashard Lewis as part of a strategy to rebuild through the draft. And that is what he did, putting together a core of Kevin Durant, Russell Westbrook and James Harden that should have won multiple championships by now if now for the ill-advised decision to trade Harden rather than max him out.

But Presti was having to operate under a tight salary cap, which is something Hinkie will not have to deal with. By the time Nerlens Noel, Joel Embiid, Dario Saric and others finish their rookie scale contracts, the salary cap will be well over $100 million — and teams will be able to carry at least three max players on their roster. Remember how Pat Riley was able to put together a trio of three superstars but needed them all to take less than the max? Hinkie will not have the same dilemma when his young core becomes max eligible. He will have a roster that will have grown up and developed and learned how to win together, and then it’ll just be a matter of keeping the right players in place and supplementing the roster with the right dose of veterans to add to the mix.

The Sixers pick third in this month’s draft, and our Joe Kotoch has them taking D’Angelo Russell of Ohio State, the self-described best player in the draft. They also have five second-round picks, and the law of averages tells us that  at least one of those players will emerge as a keeper.

Next year, the Sixers will have four No. 1 picks — their own, the Lakers’, the Thunder’s and the Heat’s. Even if only two of those four picks pan out to be great players, the core could include Noel, Embiid, Saric, Russell and at least two others.

Can you see where I’m going?

If Hinkie plays his cards right, he’ll have a core of five or six studs to build with over the next half-decade and beyond. Nobody has ever built a team this way, and by the time it is all said and done, Hinkie will be in the Hall of Fame. Mark my words on that, because you heard it here first.

More on the Sixers, the Suns, the draft and a few other items of note in the podcast below.