Anybody want to talk about actual basketball? The Sixers are back in action Monday, as they begin a three-game West Coast road trip looking to improve a shaky 1-4 record. Which players will actually be on the floor remains to be determined, but a certain nine-time All-Star wing appears set to step on the floor for the first time in the regular season,
Let's get into this week's 5 Sixers thoughts.
Paul George reportedly making season debut Monday
George met with the media following the Sixers' practice on Friday and said he felt great about the status of his left knee — he suffered a bone bruise in a preseason game on Oct. 14 — and the remainder of his ramp-up was about "cardio and conditioning."
"I'm at a good place right now," George said.
Those boxes appear to have been checked, as reports on Sunday night indicated George is expected to make his season debut on Monday when the Sixers face the Phoenix Suns.
After battling the Suns, the Sixers will travel to Los Angeles, and on Wednesday they have a contest against the Clippers that George surely has marked on his calendar. George spent a half-decade playing for his hometown team before departing for Philadelphia last summer. Many suggested that George's Sixers debut coming in the Clippers' brand new Intuit Dome on Wednesday would be fitting, but George getting his feet under him in Phoenix could enable him to look like a much better version of himself upon returning to Los Angeles.
If George is not on a hard minutes restriction, one would at least anticipate his playing time will be monitored and Sixers head coach Nick Nurse will not force him into shouldering an enormous workload right off the bat. But anything the Sixers can get from George will be a boon; they have failed to produce any consistent offense from players other than Tyrese Maxey.
Potential rotation impacts of George's return
In order to insert George into the rotation, Nurse will likely have to remove one player who is currently logging consistent minutes. He could conceivably use a 10-man rotation — if George does have a minutes restriction, this idea becomes much more plausible — but once George is at peak form, it is hard to imagine Nurse going with 10 players.
Just a few days ago, it seemed abundantly clear that rookie guard Jared McCain would be on the outside looking in. But all McCain has done since is impress, posting career-highs across the board on Wednesday and then nearly taking over Saturday's game in the fourth quarter.
McCain has been a positive contributor for the Sixers in recent games, and his signature skill — three-point shooting — only began to show itself in the fourth quarter on Saturday (more on that soon).
If Nurse wants to keep giving McCain chances to shine, how does he pivot from a rotational perspective? The answer could be to remove KJ Martin from his group of regulars. This would give the Sixers a major offensive lift, but could exacerbate their issues stemming from having a relatively undersized roster.
One potential solution: a baseball-like platoon between McCain and Martin, where Nurse's ninth and final rotation spot is decided by matchups. When the Sixers need size and defensive versatility, Nurse can keep Martin in the rotation; when they face teams without terrific size or several high-powered offensive players, McCain can get the nod. Of course, Nurse can call an audible over the course of any game, too.
For example: the Suns have decent to impressive size at pretty much every spot on the floor other than point guard, and have three dangerous scoring threats in Kevin Durant, Devin Booker and Bradley Beal. That is almost certainly a matchup in which Martin should be on the floor. The Clippers, meanwhile, have quite a few rotational guards who are not feared on-ball scorers and lack scoring firepower on the wing. That is a team Martin could have much less value playing against, while McCain's shooting could be put to good use.
MORE: Breaking down McCain's film
Will Joel Embiid play this week?
Embiid said in an explosive 12-minute media availability after Friday's practice that he "should be back pretty soon," but declined to give any sort of timeline. He has been ruled out for Monday night's game in Phoenix, but there is no public determination beyond that. Embiid opined on Friday that providing specific predictions for dates of returns and debuts is counterproductive, as it incites harsh reactions should he ultimately not suit up for a given game.
Perhaps the most substantive portion of Embiid's session was his explanation of what he says is preventing him from being on the floor: not an injury or a setback in his surgically-repaired left knee, but the mental roadblock that comes with multiple significant injuries in one area.
As Embiid explained, even if he does not feel pain in the knee when he plays, he needs to feel absolute confidence that it is completely stable in order to be comfortable risking any additional injuries to a body part that has been put through the wringer over several years.
In typical Sixers fashion, another shoe dropped when Embiid had a postgame altercation with a reporter following Saturday's game. The NBA has already said it is investigating the incident, which begs the question: could Embiid be suspended? It is easy to imagine him receiving discipline of some kind; exactly what sort of discipline that is remains to be seen.
MORE: Details on Joel Embiid's altercation with reporter
An interesting lineup combination
Circling back to McCain, at the start of the season, the biggest obstacle preventing him from receiving regular rotation minutes seemed to be veteran sharpshooter Eric Gordon. As training camp and preseason progressed, the Sixers' plans for Gordon were clearly larger than expected — even by fans of his game — and it was a bit difficult to imagine McCain and Gordon being able to consistently share the floor.
But here we are: in five of the last six halves of basketball the Sixers have played, Nurse has used at least one lineup featuring both McCain and Gordon. It is clearly a look Nurse wants to see more of as he tries to gather information early in the season about how he can best utilize the pieces at his disposal.
Having two players capable of routinely knocking down these sorts of shots on the floor at the same time can present tremendous difficulties for opposing defenses:
In the second quarter of the Sixers' loss on Saturday, Eric Gordon knocked down consecutive threes from multiple steps beyond the arc. In the fourth quarter, rookie Jared McCain did the same thing from farther out.
Each sequence took place when both players were on the floor. pic.twitter.com/kTaTEXZoVA— Adam Aaronson's clips (@SixersAdamClips) November 3, 2024
What have the two players made of their time sharing the floor with one another so far?
"The thing about Jared is," Gordon said after Saturday's game. "[I] love his attitude, love his demeanor on the court. Always aggressive, can shoot and I've always loved his style of play, very similar to mine. We take what we get. Everybody likes to respect our shot, we are both able to get to the basket when we need to. He's just a lot younger than me. He has a lot of energy."
"Anything I see from Eric Gordon," McCain said moments later. "It's really cool for me to see and just try to emulate that."
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McCain went on to state the obvious: the more he and Gordon can share the floor, the easier things will be for the Sixers' ball-dominant players.
"I always value shooting. That's why I'm in this position in the NBA," McCain said. "It's really nice to have two shooters on the floor. Spacing out, obviously makes it way better."
Caleb Martin bucking a career-long trend
Entering the season, Caleb Martin's career-high in free throw attempts in a single game was eight. In the first quarter on Saturday, he attempted eight free throws. He finished the game with 10 shots from the line, and that only tied the new career-high he set last week in Toronto.
While Caleb Martin's struggles as a scorer from the field have been pronounced — and he is not even shooting well on his many free throw attempts yet — his ability to get a whistle blown has added an additional layer of security for a Sixers offense that is starved for consistent juice.
Has that translated to wins? Clearly not. But Caleb Martin's highest career mark in free throw attempts per game over a full season is 1.6, and he is at 6.4 through five games as a Sixer. The extremity of this will not sustain, but it is at the very least something to file away for later. We are talking about a player known for tenacity and fearlessness, and that can lead to drives like this:
Caleb Martin sneaks in between a pair of defenders and goes for the glory at the rim, ultimately drawing a foul: pic.twitter.com/Jo31novNe1
— Adam Aaronson's clips (@SixersAdamClips) November 3, 2024
George's return on Monday and Embiid's eventual return will help Caleb Martin settle into an offensive role that is much more fitting for his skillset. But this development has been fascinating.
"He's turning the corner," Nurse said after Saturday's game. "He's heading into the paint… I just think he's been handling the ball a lot, and he's getting in situations where he's got to beat his guy or he's got a big guy on a switch, and he's going to try to beat his guy. And he's going in there to draw contact."
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