Welcome to our weekly Sixers mailbag, and this week's session is our penultimate one before the start of the 2025-25 NBA regular season.
Predictably, many questions about Joel Embiid poured in. We'll hit on one of those, plus questions about the Sixers' two veteran guards and a young wing:
Let's begin:
From @kellenpastore.bsky.social: Is a possible Adem Bona/Joel Embiid pairing more about getting more rebounding on the floor, or keeping Embiid from having to deal with the workload of playing the five defensively?
I think both of the things you mention are among the benefits Sixers head coach Nick Nurse imagined before deciding to invest time in developing a partnership between his two best centers. But I think the arrangement is much more about creating strategic advantages – whether it relates to size, rebounding or anything else – than it is about preserving Embiid. At Media Day last month, I asked Embiid if he had thought about any alterations he could make to the way he plays to better preserve his availability.
“That's tough," Embiid said before taking a long pause. "Yeah, I mean, think about it, but then again, at times you can't get out of yourself. All [I've known], ever since I started, is to play hard, play both ends. There's a lot of people in the league that play one side, whether it's offense or defense. For me, my mentality is to do whatever it takes to win. And all of my career actually has been having to do both.
"There's some guys that actually do a lot offensively and, you know, take plays off defensively. And there's some guys that are the best defenders and kind of like chill in the corner. I don't blame them. I've gotten to this point because of how good I am on both ends of the floor. So if you ask me to change the way I play, the only guess I have is either play offense fully and take plays off defensively – which doesn't suit me, I don't think I would ever be OK with that – so I don't know. I think we'll just wait and see. But if it's got to be that way, it's definitely going to be an adjustment. But I don't see that happening.”
Clearly, Embiid does not have designs on scaling back his intensity while on the court, particularly when it comes to the defensive impact that has made him such a uniquely dominant center. Truthfully, my question was not intended to imply Embiid should adopt a lax defensive mentality – my own thinking was more along the lines of playing fewer minutes or spending more time on offense focused on playmaking than scoring and foul-drawing – but that his mind immediately went there could be telling about the way he has processed the limitations he had last season, and how he would proceed if they become permanent.
A common criticism of Nurse during his tenure with the Sixers has been that he has lacked the creativity he was known for during his time with the Toronto Raptors. If the Sixers can devise a lineup that helps Embiid conserve some energy for a short stint every now and then, that would be a win. But perhaps this is just Nurse coming up with a creative solution to a shortage of options at power forward. He is willing to play small and will do so often in 2025-26, but Nurse is fond of massive units that can bully opposing teams.
Nurse's own words from Sunday about Embiid and Bona playing together:
"There's kind of an open position at the four, especially right now with Paul [George] not being quite ready yet," Nurse said. "There's a number of guys that we're trying to work into that spot, [Bona is] just another one… He's probably going to be more the five. He's going to play down towards the basket and rim protect and things like that. There's certainly some drive, dump-offs to him; hit Joel [or] Joel hits him type of situations that are high-percentage plays. I like that part. I think he'll help the rebounding, he'll help the rim protection. We'll see how it goes."
MORE: Joel Embiid plays in first public live action since February at scrimmage
From @bandoboncho: Justin Edwards has had a pretty bad slump since the Summer League. How much do you think his minutes would get cut to run a three-guard lineup and VJ Egdecombe sliding into the SF position?
Edwards and Kelly Oubre Jr. could both conceivably lose out on some playing time if Nurse begins relying on three-guard lineups, and I expect him to do so. Right now, Oubre appears too vital to have his minutes scaled back, which leaves Edwards. The sophomore-to-be had an uninspiring Summer League in July, though his skillset is not the kind that typically stands out in that setting. Speaking after the Sixers' shootaround on Friday morning, Edwards said he felt as if his play in two preseason games in Abu Dhabi was not all that bad. He has worked hard to be able to separate shooting results and overall process within games and felt his poor output in the former category was not reflective of poor choices on the latter front.
But a fundamental component of Edwards' role will be knocking down quick-trigger three-point shots; it is part of what powered his rise from undrafted two-way rookie to prized young asset last season. The Sixers still believe in Edwards, and they probably should. Players as young as Edwards with such small amounts of experience typically do not have such good feel for the game, and even if Edwards ends up topping out as a decent shooter on high volume instead of a particularly accurate one, that will be viable alongside his strong defense across multiple positions on the perimeter.
What Edwards can do to firmly cement his spot in the rotation regardless of three-guard lineups is prove he is a quality option as a small-ball four. Edwards played some power forward last season out of necessity; if he can convince Nurse it is more than an emergency option, he will be nearly impossible to remove from the rotation if his minutes look anything like they did last year.
Perhaps the most important part of pulling that off would be Edwards growing as a rebounder. He said last week that at his exit interview with team brass, his need to be better on the boards was emphasized. He embraced it in Summer League and has been looking for avenues to crash in preseason.
"That's something that I've taken pride in this year, is just rebounding more," Edwards said. "…They showed me numbers of stuff that I did good and stuff that I didn't do well, and rebounding was one of them."
MORE: How much can Edwards handle in second NBA season?
From @Phillyfloyd: Assuming everyone is healthy, what do you think Kyle Lowry and Eric Gordon’s roles look like on the team this year?
If everyone is healthy, I do not anticipate Lowry having any on-court role with the Sixers. His job in his 20th season is to be one of the leaders of this team, to mentor its young players, to help establish and maintain a culture and to serve as a bridge between Nurse and the players when necessary. Even if injuries begin piling up, I struggle to imagine Lowry seeing the court in any meaningful capacity. He has yet to dress for any preseason game despite seemingly not having an injury. Lowry should go into the Hall of Fame at some point, but the player that existed last season is not a rotation-caliber piece at all. Lowry is a non-creator because of his diminished burst; that also limits his defensive utility.
For what it's worth, Lowry has some self-awareness on this front. Here is what he said at Media Day when asked about the state of his hip, which he could not stop from causing issues last year:
“I feel really good. I think [I’ll be] able to just be in the court to help these guys as best I can. But I know my role this year," Lowry said, chuckling after uttering the last line. "So if I'm needed, I'll be there. But my role is to help these guys. You know, I would love to play, whatever, 25, 30 minutes, but that's not my role. It's not my job. And as a competitor, I understand my job is to help these guys and this team, whatever capacity it takes, and that's what it is.”
As for Gordon, he is set to become an 18-year veteran in his own right. Surely there is some amount of wisdom he can pass down to younger players, but his mentorship might be more individualized: Gordon is close with Sixers No. 3 overall pick VJ Edgecombe from their time as teammates with the Bahamian national team, and part of the Sixers' calculus behind bringing Gordon back was that he could continue his mentorship of Edgecombe.
While Gordon does not project to be a rotation regular given the Sixers' collection of young and talented guards, he remains one of the most decorated three-point shooters in league history. He will always be able to space the floor, standing 30 feet away from the basket ready to catch and shoot. That can provide value to an offense, especially if shots start to fall.
Gordon told PhillyVoice last month that he felt his strong run of three-point shooting in a stellar month of January was aided by him knowing what his role was going to be in terms of minutes.
"Yeah, it was tough. Because I always tell everybody, last year was the first time where my minutes were very mixed up, so it was a new thing for me," Gordon said. "But when I did know I was going to play or start or play more minutes, I kind of knew what kind of groove I was in, and that's why I did well."
The challenge for Gordon in 2025-26 will be that the consistency he desires in terms of role is going to be extremely challenging for him to attain. Gordon being someone this team can rely on for decent minutes in a pinch is absolutely conceivable; him becoming a rotation staple feels harder to imagine.
MORE: Gordon believes he's 'definitely got something to prove' in 18th NBA season
Follow Adam on Twitter: @SixersAdam
Follow PhillyVoice on Twitter: @thephillyvoice