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Stromile Swift, one of four to sign a free agent contract recently, suffered a strain to his left hamstring late in the morning practice and was not expected to participate in the night session.

He is listed as day-to-day.

Swift, a former first-round draft pick, played in a total of 19 games last season for New Jersey and Phoenix.

Other notes:

* Jason Smith is wearing a sleeve on his surgically repaired left knee, but moved well around the court. Smith missed all of last season.

* Coach Eddie Jordan yelled and stopped the practice twice when reporters were in, the first for two big men not running the court and crisscrossing with each other down low to start the offense and the other time was because an outlet to Andre Iguodala didn’t lead him far enough. “We want you out in the open floor, one-on-one,” he shouted.

* Due to his left Achilles injury suffered two seasons ago, Brand says his left calf is a half inch smaller than his right one. “I do extra lifting with it to try to balance them out. It was an inch-and-a-half smaller last year”

* Sean Singletary did a real nice job of playing on the ball defense.

* Syracuse coach Jim Boeheim was a visitor to the morning workout, as was Phil Martelli, who made the short stroll from his beautiful new office at the Ramsey Center to the practice courts.

The Sixers signed former No. 2 overall pick Stromile Swift to their roster in advance of tomorrow's start to training camp.

 The 6-10 Swift, the second overall pick by Vancouver in 2000, appeared in a total of 19 games last season for New Jersey and Phoenix. He played six games with the Nets last season before being waived in early March. Three days later, he signed with the Sun and remained on their roster for the rest of the season.

In 547 career games with 97 starts, he has averaged 8.4 points, 4.6 rebounds and 1.25 blocks in 19.8 minutes per game while shooting 47.3 percent from the floor and 69.9 percent from the line. He played in 21 games for the Nets in the 2007-08 season.

The Sixers also announced the signings of Temple product Dionte Christmas, Penn Charter grad Sean Singletary and Brandon Bowman, a rookie from Georgetown.

The team has 17 players in camp at Saint Joseph's University.

When Elton Brand signed with the Sixers last offseason, he was coming off a season in which he played only eight games due to a ruptured left Achilles tendon.

With the big contract (close to $80 million) came enormous expectations from Sixers’ fans. But Brand was far from himself during his brief stint last season when he appeared in only 28 games after dislocating his right shoulder in mid-December and subsequently undergoing surgery close to two months later.

He conceded today that his left leg was far from 100 percent.

“When I started last season, it wasn’t 100 (percent), it wasn’t there explosion-wise," Brand said during an event to unveil the Sixers' new uniforms. "But now I have the one-leg strength back, I have the two legs to bounce back. I’ve been training here the last two weeks so it feels good.”

Brand and the Sixers are only looking forward with training camp set to begin next week.

“I’m excited to be healthy, I’m excited to add to the team,” Brand admitted. “Two first round (playoff) losses the last two years for a young team is OK, but I was brought in here to go farther than that and that’s my goal and that’s what I’ve been thinking about the entire offseason."
 

Read more in tomorrow's Daily News

Two sources have confirmed that Sean Singletary, a star guard from Virginia who attended Penn Charter, Haverford School and Perkiomen School, will be in training camp with the 76ers.

The information first surfaced on CavalierDaily.com. The website said Singletary has ''a conditional contract'' with the team.

The 6-foot Singletary, 24, appeared in 13 games last season with the Phoenix Suns and 24 games with the Charlotte Bobcats. He was a second-round draft choice of the Sacramento Kings in 2008.

He joins Bryant Stith and Ralph Sampson as the only Cavaliers to be named All-Atlantic Coast Conference three times; his No. 44 jersey was retired in a ceremony Feb. 15.

The Sixers will open training camp Sept. 29 at Saint Joseph's University.

Rob Kurz, who played with the 76ers-New Jersey Nets entry in the Orlando summer league, has joined the Cleveland Cavaliers on a make-good contract. Colleague Brian Windhorst of the Cleveland Plain Dealer suggests Kurz has ''a solid chance'' of making the team.

Just after the conclusion of summer competition, Sixers president/general manager Ed Stefanski indicated he had some interest in inviting Kurz to the Sixers training camp, which opens Sept. 29 at Saint Joseph's University. There were also rumblings that the Denver Nuggets were interested.

As an undrafted rookie last season, the 6-9 Kurz averaged 3.9 points in 40 games (five starts) for the Golden State Warriors. He rang up a season-best 21 points April 11 vs. the Utah Jazz.

Rodney Carney has circled back to the 76ers.

"It's a little weird to be traded away and then to come back,'' the 6-7 guard-forward said after agreeing to the terms of a one-year contract earlier in the week.

All indications suggest that he will sign for $855,189, the NBA minimum for a player credited with three years of experience. He became an unrestricted free agent after the Minnesota Timberwolves declined picking up his option, which would have been worth $2,539,936.

Carney spent the first two seasons of his career with the Sixers. He was the No. 16 pick in the 2006 draft, taken by the Chicago Bulls and traded to the Sixers for the rights to Thabo Sefololosha. He was traded, with Calvin Booth and a first-round pick, to the Wolves last summer as the Sixers scrambled to create salary cap space to sign Elton Brand.

In an unrelated development, Sixers president/general manager Ed Stefanski has extended a training camp invitation to Dionte Christmas, the former Temple star who was not selected in the draft.

Camp begins Sept. 29 at Saint Joseph's University.

Ed Pinckney went to the NCAA Final Four in Detroit to watch Villanova, his alma mater. The last time the Wildcats had gotten that far, Pinckney had led them to a stunning championship victory over Georgetown in 1985.

This time . . .

"It was an amazing experience,'' Pinckney said on Comcast SportsNet's ''Daily News Live. ''I sat next to Rollie (former Villanova coach Rollie  Massimino) and Riley (former Miami Heat coach Pat Riley. They both were coaching both teams.''

Pinckney will not be coaching this season, at least not officially. He will, however, be analyzing. He was introduced as the analyst on 76ers telecasts, joining play-by-play voice Marc Zumoff and sideline reporter Dei Lynam. Zumoff is entering his 16th season as the play-by-p-lay voice and his 28th as a member of the Sixers broadcast team.

Pinckney, 46, is the successor to Bob Salmi.Speculation during the summer indicated he became the choice after consideration had also been given to Donyell Marshall and Rick Mahorn.

Pinckney decided his time as an assistant coach with the Minnesota Timberwolves was up when Kurt Rambis was named their new head coach and put together a staff including onetime Sixers guard Dave Wohl, Bill Laimbeer and Reggie Theus, even though he had an opportunity to remain there.

''This is my home,'' he said. ''I consider this a once-in-a-lifetime chance. It's a very historic franchise, and I had a chance to play here. I just thought this was a better opportunity for me, a chance to actually be home.''

Pinckney worked as a radio and TV analyst for the Miami Heat frrom 1997 to 2003; he was director of the Heat's mentoring programs in '02-03 before returning to Villanova as an assistant coach. He has a copmfort level not only with the responsibilities of being an analyst, but also in working with Zumoff.

''The more you do it, the more chance you have to develop chemistry with your partner, and this was an immediate chemistry,'' he said. "I've known Marc for a number of years; sitting next to him, we're just talking about the game, the way we did over the phone or when we'd see each other on the road.''

And when it's time to be critical . . .

''You have to be able to do that,'' he said. ''But the way I do it is more important. I need to be able to articulate my case, make sure it's valid and that there's some substance to it. I'll try to make sure I find a happy medium, where I can be respectful to all parties.''

And, yes, he has some of the same questions about the team that most people have.

''Sure,'' he said. "One question is how Lou Williams handles major minutes. Then, how Elton Brand manages his minutes and his health, and whether Sam (Samuel Dalembert) can play to his capabilities. But that's the case with any organization. I'm just excited to be part of it, to be able to talk about it.''

The No. 10 overall pick in the '85 draft, taken by the Phoenix Suns, Pinckney appeared in 793 regular-season games befrore retiring in '97. He logged time with the Suns, the Sacramento Kings, the Boston Celtics, the Milwaukee Bucks, the Toronto Raptors, the Sixers and the Heat. He appeared in 27 games with the Sixers in 1995-96, making 23 starts.

He arrived in mid-season, coming to a team that won 18 games, laughingly recalling the experience as ''not one of the shining moments.''

He scored 1,865 points and took 1,107 rebounds in his Villanova career. During that span, the Wildcats were 92-37, including 11-3 in NCAA tournament games. He was named the Final Four's Most Outstanding Player in 1985.

And now he's back.

"I'm back in Philly, where my heart is,'' he said.

 *

To read our earlier post on Allen Iverson and the Sixers, click here.

The messages filtered in for most of the summer, sometimes several a week. The basic premise was generally the same: If the 76ers were facing a transitional season, if they seemed to have a thin guard line, if they weren't going to win a whole lot of games, why not bring back Allen Iverson?

That troubled me, because I've always believed the basketball constituency in this area really understood and appreciated the game, especially backcourt players. But now there was a segment of fans who simply wanted a show. They wanted to recreate Iverson's performances that led him to four scoring titles and an MVP during his decade-plus here. They weren't accepting that Lou Williams, Willie Green, Royal Ivey, rookie Jrue Holiday and, at times, Andre Iguodala could be sufficiently effective, even in new coach Eddie Jordan's pass-and-cut Princeton offense.

They might be right about that part, but--and I should have said this in Sixerville much earlier--they were wrong about bringing back Iverson.

He might turn up in Memphis, or possibly in Charlotte, and he might sell some tickets and create some marketing benefits in those markets, but there would be no reason for him to turn up as a re-born Sixer. The evidence shows in his post-Sixers career in Denver and Detroit: The Nuggets improved dramatically when they acquired Chauncey Billups in a trade for Iverson; the Pistons became so disenchanted with Iverson's rebellion against coming off the bench that they sent him home.

So, each time an emailer broached the subject of bringing him back to the Sixers, I patiently tried to explain:

He's not the player he was during the Sixers' spectacular run to the NBA Finals in 2000-01. You can't live on memories.

He insists on playing major minutes, and that would mean holding back the development of Williams and Holiday. Williams has played four full seasons and has never started a game; it's time to find out whether he can be the3 backcourt leader. Holiday might not play much at the start, but--unless you're challenging for a championship--why give even those minutes to an aging star? That was part of the thinking in allowing Andre Miller to leave in free agency.

Iverson has never been one to make the players around him better. Even during '00-01, the opposite was true. Eric Snow, Aaron McKie, George Lynch, Tyrone Hill, Theo Ratliff and Dikembe Mutombo took care of the defense, rebounding, scratching and clawing, allowing Iverson to provide the offense. When word surfaced that Iverson could be joining the Bobcats, the Charlotte Observer's Rick Bonnell turned to former Sixers president/general manager Billy King for perspective. Among other things, King said "Allen never made the people around him better in the first place, because it's always about Allen.''

King also told the Observer ''Everything is about Allen, and it can't all be about Allen at this point in his career. He's no longer that intimidating figure who can just blow by everybody. So he's got to do other things, and I'm not sure he will.''

And: "When Allen plays the point, nobody else touches the ball.''

That's not the type of player I would want mentoring my young guards.

I understand the deep loyalty of Iverson's fans. They sincerely love their guy. They will revel in someday seeing his jersey retired in the Wachovia Center. They miss the show. In a way, I do, too. He was a phenomenon, filling the arena the way no player ever had. I don't know why this particular memory has stayed with me, but I remember a night when the Daily News was celebrating the retirement of editor Zach Stallberg. I missed the arly portion of the party in town because I covered the Sixers game first. I paid my respects to Stallberg by laughingly saying ''In honor of you, Allen just dropped 60.''

Allen could do things like that.

The show, at some level, will go on, in Memphis or Charlotte or somewhere.

But not here. That time has come and gone.

Poll: Should the Sixers bring back Iverson? (2778 votes)