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76ers 2020 wrote:hookshot199 wrote:We can agree to disagree. Fact is, they won around 27% of their games after the first 17; 27% is 22 wins. The Sixers have better personnel this year than last. So do other teams in the East. Carmelo will be back. So will Bosh. Etc., etc. Unless we have a key front court injury, we're not going to be terrible. And our second team is going to wear older teams in the second half. If you watched them last year, the model's already in place.
The problem with looking at the their win percentage without the losing streak is that the team got slightly worse after the MCW and McDaniels trade. Team had a higher winning percentage the first 53 games even when you count the losing streak. First 53 games 12-41 .226, post trade 6-23 .207. MCW missed games as well while here. Total the team was 11-31 when he played so total the team had a .355 winning percentage with MCW and .175 with out him. I watched them last year and the team was winning by wearing teams down. Problem is our defensive strength on the perimeter while that was happening is diminished. On top of that Noel will be away from the rim more often.
Yes, but in that period if you recall, we were suiting up two rent-a-players for several games (Tim Frazier and Larry Drew II), playing Jakaar as backup point, before finally settling on two career backups (Canaan-ball and Ish Smith).
If any of the Hinkie haters want evidence of a tank last year, it would be in his failure to sign a veteran point at the beginning of the season when Carter-Williams was down and then spent his first 5-10 games back trying to play himself into shape. Then he went down again in early February before Hinkie brought in Canaan-ball and Ish.
I don't know where one would split the period when Carter-Williams had recovered to some sort of playing form, but for the sake of argument let's say our 20th game, his 10th or 11th game. He played a total of 41 for us. Which means we had our starting point guard (imperfect as he may be) for around 30 games. During that period, we playing .300 ball if I recall.
And this was around the time Noel started playing like Rookie of the Year.
As for KJ, his departure gave minutes to Grant who, overall, is a better player. Trading him was a case of addition by subtraction in my opinion. And Jakaar's a beast on D. But time will tell.
But just as a frame of reference: If we were to say Game 1 of our season was Dec. 10, following our second win in three nights, we won nine of our next 30 games, when Carter-Williams went down a second time. That's .300 ball.
Prorated over an 82-game season, that would have been 25 wins. That's without a center, a shooter at two (even if Stauskas is off the bench), and effectively no starting point guard for 50 games (we still don't have a starting point).
BTW: Frazier and Drew-II played in a combined 18 games.
