PHILADELPH
IA – No, that wasn’t a puff of white smoke emanating from the Philadelphia 76ers offices when their 118-day vigil finally came to an end Wednesday.
It was more like they were waving the white flag, as if to say “Okay, we surrender. We’ll hire a coach, even though we all know the goal is to stink so bad this year we have the best chance to win the lottery, and a good coach might mess up the plan…’’
With that, “Nice to have you around for the next four years, Brett Brown.’’
Just how reluctant were the Sixers to acknowledge what the rest of the hoops world had known was a done deal? Well, for 48 hours the big news on the team’s site was unveiling a series of 10-game ticket plans for loyal fans, not even a hint that Gregg Popovich’s trusted second assistant was on his way to fill Doug Collins four-months long gone sneakers. Still plenty of good seats available, but hurry!
If only Brown and the Sixers could flip a switch and make the upcoming season disappear. Just assign them their 60 losses or perhaps a lot more of lumps and reserve them a spot in the Andrew Wiggins Derby next May. Universally everyone agrees that’s where they’re headed. So why make them suffer the indignity of going through that 82-game ordeal?
Of course, it just doesn’t work that way in the NBA, where only eight franchises have won a championship in the past 30 years. (Baseball, by contrast, has had 19 different winners.) David Stern and his waiting-in-the-wings successor, Adam Silver, will insist everyone play out their dance card, even if they’re wallflowers.
Because every so often the ugly duckling turns into a swan.
Yet neither Brown nor Sixers GM San Hinkie, who never apologized for taking so long to fill the final open seat No.13 on the NBA’s 2013 coaching carousel, have no illusions. At the same time, they’re not about to change course, knowing the only thing worse than being truly bad in this league is being perpetually mediocre.
Who better then to take over a team mired at the bottom of the standings than a man who spent 14 years plying his trade Down Under, including coaching the 2012 Australian National team in the Olympics?
“It is at times gonna be painful,’’ admitted Brown, who inherits the remnants of a 34-48 team which promptly traded its best player – All-Star point guard Jrue Holiday – for the rights to injured 7-foot Kentucky center Nerlens Noel and New Orleans’ first-round pick in next year’s highly anticipated draft. “It’s hard going through a normal rebuild process.
“But I think you have to stay focused on what you’re really there for and not pay that much attention to the results.”