Colangelo hints at shrinking role for Hinkie

IF ANY HINKIEBOTS remain, Jerry Colangelo's proclamations at NBA All-Star Weekend must have shaken their world like an Aaron Gordon dunk.

Colangelo announced that he expects to hire an experienced "basketball mind" to create "the strongest front office in the league."

. . . Because the front office Sam Hinkie created is not even close.

Colangelo, who is 76, said he intends for the Sixers to be a dangerous playoff team within three years, when his contract expires.

. . . Because hoarding draft picks, losing on purpose and spending no money is a criminally flawed methodology.

For the Sons of Sam who remain true to the cult, a translation might be in order.

This is Colangelo, a Hall of Fame executive, serving definitive notice that Hinkie's amorphous "process" has been abandoned. When owner Josh Harris cleaned house in 2013, he hired Hinkie, a 35-year-old analytics whiz from the Houston Rockets, to rebuild. Hinkie not only had never been a general manager, but he had never worked with a GM who had a solid basketball background. Hinkie's plan: accumulate "assets" in the form of young players and draft picks, clear cap space and grow a product that, at a point undefined, would contend for a title. Hinkie's product: a dysfunctional team whose talent and performance was the worst in NBA history.

This is Colangelo, a four-time executive of the year, declaring that no asset is sacred: not this year's overvalued, protected first-round picks from the Lakers, Heat and Thunder; not Dario Saric, the European unicorn on whom Hinkie spent a first-round pick two years ago.

This is Colangelo, an NBA giant, letting everyone know that, despite Hinkie's assertions in the Inquirer 12 days ago, Hinkie is not Colangelo's peer. He is a subordinate whose job is under review.

Don't undervalue the timing of Colangelo's statement. Colangelo broke into the NBA as a PR man for the Bulls, built the Suns from their inception and helped create modern-day spin.

Hinkie flexed a little bit.

Colangelo flexed back.

And don't forget: Harris hired Colangelo in December because Hinkie had been derelict in his duties.

Colangelo came aboard right after franchise center Jahlil Okafor took part in two street fights in Boston during a road trip, the culmination of a series of untoward incidents in Okafor's rookie season.

Colangelo quickly discovered that Hinkie, a bright, young analytics expert with a gift for making trades, had constructed a franchise with plenty of draft picks and lots of financial leverage. However, the team lacked the sort of veteran leadership and guidance that keeps rookies out of street fights in Boston.

Colangelo also discovered that Hinkie evaded accountability, usually leaving coach Brett Brown to clean up the messes Hinkie made.

Colangelo quickly reacquired point guard Ish Smith, whom Hinkie spurned in the offseason despite Smith's remarkable synergy last season with big man Nerlens Noel. Colangelo soon added center Elton Brand to mentor Noel and Okafor. Colangelo also snagged former Suns coach Mike D'Antoni, a respected basketball mind, to provide stability to Brown's undecorated bench.

To what end? Perhaps to Hinkie's end.

Hide the barbiturates and the Kool-Aid.

Consider the circumstances.

Colangelo has been on the job for about two months. That has given him plenty of time to examine the operation Hinkie constructed over 2 1/2 seasons: scouting, evaluation, medical staff, support staff, coaching staff, the works. Colangelo knows the outsized value Hinkie & Co. place on the different tiers of draft picks, and Colangelo has seen the disdain Hinkie has for midlevel veteran talent.

Consider, also, that Colangelo just represented the Sixers at the NBA's most high-profile convention - a convention at which the Sixers were utterly irrelevant. The only player in Colangelo's system who might sniff the All-Star Game within three years is Okafor, who also is the Sixers' most likely trade asset.

Finally, the Sixers' historic ability to lose games has made them a national punch line.

This must have been a humiliating weekend for a man like Colangelo, who essentially created the sports scene in Phoenix and who revived USA Basketball.

All-Star Weekend also gave Colangelo his first chance to gauge Hinkie's profile, leaguewide, during informal, organic conversations. Since his arrival in Philadelphia, Hinkie has been cast as a dismissive, difficult negotiator.

It doesn't sound like Colangelo liked what he heard.

What will it mean?

Perhaps it means trading draft picks in a one-team or multiteam deal by the deadline Thursday that lands the Sixers a player like Hawks point guard Jeff Teague. He is owed a modest $8 million this season and next. Even if Teague is not the long-term answer, he would be a monumental upgrade over Smith, a career backup who was a monumental upgrade over Hinkie's four-man joke of a point-guard rotation.

Colangelo already has contacted the Hawks about their point guards, according to several reports. Why? Because NBA talents like Okafor, Noel and Jerami Grant only blossom when a team is run by a competent point guard.

For now, that trio of players forms the nucleus around which Colangelo hopes to build a playoff contender, sooner than later.

For now, Hinkie will be part of any conversation concerning improving the team's personnel.

It will be interesting to see, once Colangelo adds an experienced "basketball mind," how much Hinkie's voice diminishes.

It will be almost as interesting to see if the Cult of Hinkie survives.

hayesm@phillynews.com

@inkstainedretch

Blog: phillynews.com/Sixersblog