BROOKLYN, NY — When the Sixers ruled out Joel Embiid and Tyrese Maxey, everyone at the Barclays Center knew nine-time All-Star Paul George was primed to lead the way for his team offensively against a lowly Brooklyn Nets team.
Or, at least, they thought they knew that.
What transpired instead was jarring: George, with free rein to take ownership of the Sixers' offense, scored only two points in 37 minutes, making one of his seven field goal attempts — including all five of his three-point tries — while also only collecting four assists despite plenty of on-ball chances.
George, who missed five games due to an injury to the extensor tendon in his left pinky finger, has now been back for five games in which he has played with a splint on that finger. George has averaged only 10.2 points and 2.8 assists per game on subpar efficiency since returning, culminating in a disastrous showing on Wednesday in Brooklyn. This stretch has without a doubt been the lowest point of a disappointing season for George, who has underwhelmed to date after signing a four-year max contract worth well over $200 million to join the Sixers in hopes of winning his first NBA championship.
After the game, George and Sixers head coach Nick Nurse discussed his rough night against the Nets and ongoing troubles with that finger splint:
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• Nurse on why he thought George was unable to impact the game much offensively:
"They did a lot of double-teaming on him, for one thing. So that limited some of his shot opportunities. I thought he had just a couple other ones that I thought maybe he would have pulled the trigger on as well. I just thought he was really giving good effort and playing, which is why I kept him in there. He was really good defensively. I know it's not offensively what we want to see, but he was plus-eight in plus/minus, so he was giving some great effort on D and playing pretty hard."
• Nurse on if he would have liked George to be more aggressive offensively with Embiid and Maxey sidelined:
"Yeah, I mean I think he had a couple opportunities there, and again, they double-teamed him a lot, they weren't going to give him a ton of looks. I thought they pressured him up the floor when he got in actions, even off-ball stuff they would send two to him. So he didn't really have much choice on a lot of them to move the ball. I thought he did turn down a couple that I really expected him to shoot. But again, he's moving the ball, playing hard on D, all that kind of stuff. Did we need him to score more points? Yeah, but we needed lots of people to as well. The offense was tough tonight."
• Nurse on how he believes George's splint has impacted his performance:
"The only thing I can say is, you probably have to ask him how he’s feeling about it. I do — usually he says it feels like it’s getting better, but where that’s coming from, what point that’s coming from, I don’t know. I do notice some mishandles out there with his left hand — not necessarily turnovers, but just not so in-rhythm and smooth, things that probably affect both his getting into his shot and his passing a little bit. So, I mean, you said it: it is, you know, not great efficiency since he hurt his finger, right? Hopefully we’ll get it some time and hopefully it’ll heal up and get a little bit better. He missed five games before that, too, and right before that I thought he was really starting to come into his own, so hopefully we can get him back to that rhythm at some point."
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• George on why he felt unable to establish any sort of offensive presence:
"I mean, they just blitzed me. They blitzed me. Any time I had the ball, whether it was pick-and-rolls, whether I had it up top, I tried to just counter that with playing through my teammates, try to make the game easy. We got good shots for the most part, it just wasn't enough shots in."
• George on how his finger feels right now:
"It’s tough. The pain pretty much went down, but little things like ball-handling, catching it, going left at moments. Like there’s a couple plays tonight where it bobbled a bit because I got to essentially play like this all game [displays inability to move left pinky]. So, you know, it’s frustrating, but it is what it is."
• George on how the splint has impacted him through five games and if he thinks he will be able to develop any sense of comfort playing with it on his finger:
"I mean, it is what it is. I’m going to have to always play like this [displays inability to move left pinky]. We’ve just got to work around it. You know, hopefully the splint gets smaller and smaller and the pinky has a little bit more range and mobility in it as opposed to just being in the air all game. So I doubt things will change in five games, but it is what it is again at this point."
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