Sixers owner optimistic that team is on the way up

GALLOWAY TOWNSHIP, N.J. - Four days into training camp and 76ers majority owner Josh Harris gave his state-of-the-team talk with reporters while the team was on the practice floors at Richard Stockton College.

Not surprisingly, Harris is happy with the team's direction, saying that it's "bottomed," but now everything is going up, not down. He says he knows the process is long, but is confident that the fans are on board and that the team will be a championship contender when the rebuild is complete.

"Year 2 of our long-run plan that we laid out," Harris said. "We're very excited to be here. Just being here, you can feel the difference in terms of the emphasis on player development, the amount of work that's going on, the exciting new players that are running up and down the court, the strength and conditioning that is going on, the focus on nutrition. I feel we've set up the culture well. The basketball side of the house and the business side of the house [are] creating excellence from the bottom up. And we're beginning to see some of the players that we picked."

Some, not all. Rookie Joel Embiid (foot) probably will make his debut in about a year, and Dario Saric is still at least 3 years from getting here because of his overseas contract. That kind of makes for a bit of a short time frame for all of these things to come to fruition, and here's why.

One of the selling points to get Brett Brown to coach here was the promise of a new practice facility that would be the best in the NBA. A deal was finally reached in June for a practice facility in Camden, longer than initially thought. Another problem is that construction won't start "until about the end of the year," according to Harris.

If that takes a couple of years to build, you're looking at the Sixers' being there maybe sometime for the 2016-17 season. That also happens to be the last year of Brown's contract. That also could coincide with popular San Antonio coach Gregg Popovich ending his Hall of Fame career. Perhaps the Spurs make a play for Brown going home. And Saric still won't be playing in the NBA yet, after being drafted by the Sixers last June.

"We're always in a hurry," Harris said. "My philosophy is you're only here for a certain amount of time, so you have to get busy and add value every day. But at the same time, there are no shortcuts to building excellence. It's about putting the right people in place and providing the resource and allowing them to do their job. The practice facility, we'll be starting work on that sometime around the end of the year. It will be the largest in the NBA, it will be the best, state-of-the-art practice facility in the NBA.

"It's taken a little longer, because the coach wanted input, Sam [Hinkie, general manager] wanted input, and building something excellent takes a little while to plan. But that's a perfect example of how we're going to operate. It's hard to put a time frame on it specifically, but we are going to get better from here. Every season. We've bottomed, and now together we build. It's not going down from here; it's going up."

The team finished another long session yesterday, on the floor for almost 4 hours for the fourth straight day. While the practices are long, they eliminate a night session, which is common for training camps.

"Of course, when you go a long time you kind of get mentally messed up," guard Tony Wroten said. "But, like I tell everybody, coach came from the Spurs. He's a champion, so whatever he's going to have us do, we'll do it."

There have been some casualties, as Jerami Grant remained out of action because of dehydration. Brown said he hopes to have him back on the court tomorrow. Jarvis Varnado also sat again with soreness in his right Achilles' tendon. Guard Elliott Williams sported a large bandage over his right eye after getting hit during the session.

The team will practice today and tomorrow before flying tomorrow afternoon to Boston for its first preseason game against the Celtics on Monday.

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