Brookover: Embiid's absences make process tough to grasp
They raised cats and pledged allegiance to the process again Monday night at the Wells Fargo Center, another testament to the rebirth of the 76ers following a long and controversial hibernation.
They raised cats and pledged allegiance to the process again Monday night at the Wells Fargo Center, another testament to the rebirth of the 76ers following a long and controversial hibernation.
The 122-119 win over the Sacramento Kings allowed the Sixers to finish January at 10-5, matching the team's victory total from a year ago. Two more and the team will surpass the number of wins coach Brett Brown accumulated in each of his first three seasons, and the All-Star Game is still nearly three weeks away.
And, yet, the Sixers remain so confounding that I've opted to let my cat sleep through another day while remaining at least a little leery of the process.
The Process - Joel Embiid - is the reason.
Before the Sixers' seventh home win in eight games, the team announced that Embiid would be out with a bruised left knee, an injury he suffered in a Jan. 20 game against Portland. He will not play Wednesday in Dallas or Thursday in San Antonio because he did not even travel with the team on the Texas portion of a four-game road trip.
"There isn't anything odd going on," Brown assured reporters. "It's just that we feel like it's best for him to get him to where he needs to be and to keep him behind with the resources that we have here and the rest he can get while he's here."
There is no reason to believe something is seriously wrong with Embiid, although what the 76ers have so far called only a bruise is apparently a bone bruise, which can be very painful. Brown conceded that Embiid was sore after his 32-point performance against Houston on Friday.
"Yeah, there is [soreness] or he would be coming [to Texas]," Brown said. "His head is in a good place. We're all in a good place. It is just part of this year, managing our guys. There are no red flags here. It's just us going overboard making sure that we're doing the right thing with what we're all learning to be a very important person in our program."
Embiid went through his pregame shooting ritual before Tuesday's game and was in a jovial mood as he messed around with teammate Dario Saric before the game. Those things do not happen if Embiid received some sort of awful news about his knee or his surgically repaired right foot.
This, then, is all simply part of the process.
"We do tilt at this early stage on being very paranoid about keeping our better players healthy," Brown said.
No denying that. The process introduced by former general manager Sam Hinkie was about a lot more than losing games in hopes of winning at the draft lottery. He was heavy into sleep studies, nutrition, and sports medicine, which, by no means, makes him the Lone Ranger in the second decade of the 21st century. The 76ers have obviously clung to all those beliefs that Hinkie held so sacred, which is fine.
At some point, however, the 76ers must throw their most talented players into the deep end of the pool and see if they can swim when one of their limbs does not feel exactly right. Playing in some level of pain is part of being a professional athlete, and a really important part at that.
So when does that time come for Embiid? When do the 76ers let him out of the bubble wrap and rely on him to tell them when he can and cannot fight through pain?
Not yet is the obvious answer. Brown said things should change as the team gets better, but he also admits that times have changed.
"It's one of my personal greatest challenges because I think that our league is changing for a lot of reasons," the coach said. "Sports science has completely engulfed certainly American pro sports and the NBA. . . . How do you keep your best players healthy? Then you have agents that are involved who want to do the right thing by their client.
"The durability thing seems to go away as the years progress. I was with Bruce Bowen when he played [500] games in a row. You look back at the Andre Miller days [80 games played in 14 seasons] and it's hard to find those soldiers that just play all the time for all the reasons that I just said."
After Embiid sits out Wednesday and Thursday, he will have missed seven of the team's last 11 games. He has not played more than six games in a row this season.
Here's hoping that the process is the only thing holding The Process back right now. Otherwise cats will be the only things being raised at the Wells Fargo Center.
@brookob