The Sixers should let Brett Brown go

[kenwood3333]

Doug Collin was fired back in 1989 despite his popularity, Phil Jackson, the replacement and won six titles afterwards.

[Sixerscan]

If the Sixers dont get to the NBA Finals or even the ECF, Philly should absolutely consider firing Brown. But not right now.

Yep. They’re not making a change in season, but if they have a disappointing performance in the playoffs it will be in play.

It’s easy to say to fire the coach, but the fact is there aren’t a lot of proven head coaches available. If brown gets let go, he’ll probably immediately have close to the best resume of any coach on the open market. So you’re left with hiring someone unproven who could be a Jason Kidd just as easily as a Steve Kerr.

[VDT]

As i said i would be very surprised if a coach can have a high caliber offense with Horford, Embiid and Simmons in the same lineup. I think the hope is for Simmons to improve his scoring and thus to have a robust, though still not modern or high scoring, offense that coupled with the defense will be good enough to win the title.

I think also Brown is liked by the players so there is a chance there will be chemistry issues if he is fired, although these issues might arise regardless if the Sixers disappoint this year.

Fair point about the roster. I haven't delved deep into their rotations and on-off with lineups, but I have a different hypothetical: if Brett Brown got buy-in from Ben Simmons to play as the extremely versatile 4 (think athletic and better Draymond Green), would the team have even signed Horford in the first place?

I hear that a lot but i feel the similarities are a bit superficial. Simmons has never shown much ability to protect the rim and at the same time he doesnt shoot. Without these two skills i am not sure how much he could be a better Draymond. More importantly i dont think that he wants to defend 4s and 5s for the entirety of the game like Draymond and i dont think the team was/is ready to accept that their nr1 pick, on a max contract is a roleplayer. Simmons best attributes ae his athleticism, his court vision and his dribble for his size while his worst is the shooting. If you take him off the ball what do you really have? A non shooting, non rim protecting PF that will be on a max contract. Simmons needs the ball to maximize his impact and that's what Brown and the team have tried. The roblem is that he is not that good with the ball at the moment. He cant become like Giannis, but if he would be Giannis lite in terms of finishig it would solve most of the Sixers problems as well as his. Because at the moment is in no mans land as a player, he needs the team built around him but he is not good enough to justify that.

[Sixerscan]

As i said i would be very surprised if a coach can have a high caliber offense with Horford, Embiid and Simmons in the same lineup. I think the hope is for Simmons to improve his scoring and thus to have a robust, though still not modern or high scoring, offense that coupled with the defense will be good enough to win the title.

I think also Brown is liked by the players so there is a chance there will be chemistry issues if he is fired, although these issues might arise regardless if the Sixers disappoint this year.

Fair point about the roster. I haven't delved deep into their rotations and on-off with lineups, but I have a different hypothetical: if Brett Brown got buy-in from Ben Simmons to play as the extremely versatile 4 (think athletic and better Draymond Green), would the team have even signed Horford in the first place?

I hear that a lot but i feel the similarities are a bit superficial. Simmons has never shown much ability to protect the rim and at the same time he doesnt shoot. Without these two skills i am not sure how much he could be a better Draymond. More importantly i dont think that he wants to defend 4s and 5s for the entirety of the game like Draymond and i dont think the team was/is ready to accept that their nr1 pick, on a max contract is a roleplayer. Simmons best attributes ae his athleticism, his court vision and his dribble for his size while his worst is the shooting. If you take him off the ball what do you really have? A non shooting, non rim protecting PF that will be on a max contract. Simmons needs the ball to maximize his impact and that's what Brown and the team have tried. The roblem is that he is not that good with the ball at the moment. He cant become like Giannis, but if he would be Giannis lite in terms of finishig it would solve most of the Sixers problems as well as his. Because at the moment is in no mans land as a player, he needs the team built around him but he is not good enough to justify that.

Also not really sure who Brown was supposed to play at point guard over the years instead of Simmons unless you wanted him to play TJ McConnell 40 minutes per game. They tried with Fultz but he kept not being available.

[SkyHookFTW]

This thread also points out how the Fultz pick really hurt this team. If Fultz became what he was supposed to be this thread probably doesn't get made.

[HotelVitale]

I don't think so. A) We all got excited about the huge roster but it's shown to be redundant and lacking versatility. They can play big... and they can play big. B) Ben should be playing power forward but they gave a four year contract to Horford to do the things Ben should be doing. C) They lack 3pt shooting. They lack a closer. Brett doesn't have remote control to make Ben shoot the ball when he flat out refuses to do so.

Barking up the wrong trees here. A) They frequently play without a center, and Simmons has no trouble whatsoever guarding all but the biggest of bigs so they could potentially play him and Harris as the only 'bigs'; they also have many guys who can play inside and outside, so the problem isn't that they just can't be 'versatile; B) Horford's main role is hitting jumpers, exploiting mismatches and bigs who are smaller than him, and passing from the high post, while Simmons has one of the best combos of passing, handling, and burst we've ever seen; Simmons is also an ace perimeter defender while Horford's great at slowing big bigs; they're obviously doing and bringing different things; C) This is bizarre, given that literally everyone in their rotation is a threat to shoot besides Simmons; they have great stretch bigs in Mike Scott and Horford, great catch-and-shoot threats from the wings in Harris, Korkmaz, and Richardson (Thybulle's solid at that role as well), and overall there's no way they won't shake out as at least average there. The problem is real but it isn't as simple as any of these three things.

The more I look at the Sixers, the more it becomes clear that they are just trying to stack together whatever players they can that look good on paper, but then have no actual functional schemes or strategy when on the court. And you can't even say they try to play bully ball overall, because that tactic only works for them against weak teams, but ends up hurting them against smart ones. It's not Brown himself(though he does play a part and is responsible for the blame on the planning aspect on court), but more like the collective BBall IQ on the entire team is extremely low. That combined with them having essentially zero flow or rhythm, is brutal.

This seems a little more on target, but you lost me when you jump to a 'collective lack of BBIQ' and then to 'zero rhythm.' I'm not sure why you'd let Brown off the hook for running only post-ups and a dribble hand-off system that hasn't been very successful in the PO for 3 years running now and that requires crisper execution than any other offense; why is 'collective IQ' responsible rather than a lack of 'functional schemes'? And why do you think that the Sixers player have an inherent lack of basketball know-how?

[Optms]

So fire a coach who has been here throughout this process and has a championship contending team right now?

Lol!

That team has too much talent not to contend. In fact they are actually underachieving. Any run of the mill coach can have them at the same position they're in right now. He's a scrub coach.

[Detective]

The more I look at the Sixers, the more it becomes clear that they are just trying to stack together whatever players they can that look good on paper, but then have no actual functional schemes or strategy when on the court. And you can't even say they try to play bully ball overall, because that tactic only works for them against weak teams, but ends up hurting them against smart ones. It's not Brown himself(though he does play a part and is responsible for the blame on the planning aspect on court), but more like the collective BBall IQ on the entire team is extremely low. That combined with them having essentially zero flow or rhythm, is brutal.

This seems a little more on target, but you lost me when you jump to a 'collective lack of BBIQ' and then to 'zero rhythm.' I'm not sure why you'd let Brown off the hook for running only post-ups and a dribble hand-off system that hasn't been very successful in the PO for 3 years running now and that requires crisper execution than any other offense; why is 'collective IQ' responsible rather than a lack of 'functional schemes'? And why do you think that the Sixers player have an inherent lack of basketball know-how?

Sorry, allow me to clarify further.

The planning and execution aspect is on Brown, which aligns more to team style and structure when they are on the court. They run basic themes, and aren't a tactical X and O's or creative play team by any means. But the latter portion requires certain players, and a willingness to execute a certain style.

But regarding the collective team BBall IQ, well, it's because the Sixer players play rather stupidly at times. It's extremely disjointed. There is nothing deliberate or smooth about what they do. A coach can give them foundation and instruction, but it's on them to execute and adapt on the fly. Or to play more instinctive based on awareness(or lack thereof in their case). I remembered it so well during our series in the playoffs(those multiple consecutive shot clock violations, cluttered chaos in the paint, when Embiid and Simmons should naturally have a better sense of judgment for where the other is, Tobias is so easy to bait, and collect FT's off of because his D is a liability etc. ) and it seemed to continue more recently in our game earlier in the week, even with our injured roster.

Sometimes I feel that Brown is limited with what he can do, because his choice of pieces are faulty(i.e. Simmons not putting in enough effort to shoot better, Joel getting lazy and gassed due to lack of discipline) and too inconsistent. Which is more of an issue with what the Front Office did. Can he execute more than post-ups and dribble hand-offs when the cards in his hands are a bunch of jokers?

Here is an example of a roster filled with high BBall IQ players. Everything is deliberate, disciplined, and when they do encounter an unknown variable, the players adapt, adjust and self execute on their own. It's instinctual.

Watch on YouTube

I mentioned this to another user, but the Sixers are a talented but extremely flawed roster. They are a weapon, but a blunt weapon and definitely not anything precision tuned or honed through effort. They try to get by on the talent they have on paper, which doesn't do much when the other team is smarter or executes better based on effort/time spent using a system.

[HotelVitale]

The planning and execution aspect is on Brown, which aligns more to team style and structure when they are on the court. They run basic themes, and aren't a tactical X and O's or creative play team by any means. But the latter portion requires certain players, and a willingness to execute a certain style. But regarding the collective team BBall IQ, well, it's because the Sixer players play rather stupidly at times. It's extremely disjointed. There is nothing deliberate or smooth about what they do. A coach can give them foundation and instruction, but it's on them to execute and adapt on the fly...Here is an example of a roster filled with high BBall IQ players. Everything is deliberate, disciplined, and when they do encounter an unknown variable, the players adapt, adjust and self execute on their own. It's instinctual.

I agree with bad execution as a diagnosis of the problem but I'm not sure about concluding the Sixers are running the best sets for them and just aren't smart enough to make them work. Not just because it's almost always too simple to take the current result as inevitable but also because a) the personnel seems smart enough and b) because the Sixers simply weren't making it easy on themselves the last couple years. For a), easiest evidence is that we now have notoriously great executor Al Horford plus Josh Richardson (who was always lauded for effort and precision on the Heat)--not to mention that no one thought Tobias had a low IQ before joining the Sixers--and we still look just as ugly and sloppy on offense as the last two years. I also don't recall anyone from the past couple years looking good in the DHO and post-ups system, everyone's seemed like they were playing sort of panicked and not getting much easy. I don't know if their system just brings out the worst in those players or if they just haven't found chemistry (or if Embiid and Simmons being the main pieces just makes the system shaky), but it seems too easy to see sloppy offense and say it's sloppy thinking. Not blaming Brown and I don't think he's done anything wrong per se, but it's possible the DHOs just aren't the best option or are making things harder than they need to be for this particular group.

Also agree that all of bball is instinct and reacting but I don't think anyone would disagree that certain teams and orgs manage to put their players in better situations and get better execution regardless of who's playing. I mean, you don't think everyone on the Raptors is just inherently bright right?

[Ballerhogger]

And replace him with who ? Going into mid season?

[VDT]

The Sixers offense looks sometimes clunky not because of their basketball IQ but because they lack a perimeter player that can put the offense off balance. Embiid can do it from the post, attracting double teams, but there are issues there too that can limit how much the team can exploit it.

Having said that, the Sixers are not the only team like that. They may be the most obvious example because they try to feed Embiid in the post but there are a lot, if not all, of teams nowadays that often enough their offense is limited to just chucking 3s which is not some terribly high IQ offense either.

[Michael Jordan]

I could see Brown being let go after a disappointing playoff run this year. Maybe Mike Brown, Rex Kalamian, or Ty Lue could join in the off-season as head coaches.

[dhsilv2]

I always assumed they'd move him into management and bring in a new coach...but then they promoted Brand to GM.

[JB2]

I don't think so. We all got excited about the huge roster but it's shown to be redundant and lacking versatility. They can play big... and they can play big. Ben should be playing power forward but they gave a four year contract to Horford to do the things Ben should be doing. They lack a point guard who can shoot off the dribble. They lack 3pt shooting. They lack a closer. Brett doesn't have remote control to make Ben shoot the ball when he flat out refuses to do so.

And all that said they still have a solid record and plenty of time to figure things out. They are definitely a threat come playoff time.

I've been saying this for months... they should have targeted D'lo instead of Horford or if not spread that money around on a bunch of versatile depth and a guard who can create/attack.

[levon]

I could see Brown being let go after a disappointing playoff run this year. Maybe Mike Brown, Rex Kalamian, or Ty Lue could join in the off-season as head coaches.

I would actually love to see the Sixers under Ty Lue. I think he's a top 10 offensive coach.

[basketballRob]

I'd like to see Al Horford's wife coach, so i could see her all the time. I didn't realize she's 6'2", wow.

Sent from my SM-G950U using RealGM mobile app

[jason bourne]

If I was going to hire a coach, then I probably would not hire Brett Brown because he isn't a winning coach. His W-L record is 192-320.

However, what one has to consider is he has coached the Sixers his entire NBA career through having weak players and then tanking in order to get better players in the draft through The Process. We also have to consider the GM changes made from Sam Hinkie, Bryan Colangelo, and now Elton Brand because of the players they drafted. Thus, for this reason, the Sixers management has given Brett Brown a long leash. Their GM changes have changed the team. Usually, coaches don't last a GM change, but for whatever reason, Brown has. Maybe he provides some stability to a changing organization.

I don't think they have reason to fire Brown as they have just started to make the playoffs the past two years, and currently they are in fifth place and battling to rise to third or fourth place. They've lost some key players like Jimmy Butler, Markelle Fultz, Robert Covington, and JJ Redick during the past two years.

[jason bourne]

Here's Brown's coaching record. Not as horrible as you think.

https://www.statscrew.com/basketball/stats/c-brownbr01

[Clyde Frazier]

I don't think Brett Brown is Mark Jackson.

[PhilBlackson]

Agreed.

The man doesn't know how to use the team's best and most important weapon; Embiid and between that and not holding him accountable for his weight etc (which admittingly Joel deserves more blame for).... it's limiting what the Sixers are capable of.

With Embiids talent and surrounding roster both this year and last there's no reason they shouldn't at least be a staple in the Conference Finals. Embiid should be ragdolling dudes on the blocks and snatching team's souls like dominant bigs through out history have. Instead BB has him bricking 3s as if he's a mobile small ball C like Draymond.

BB (and Simmons for a dynamic scoring option on the wing) need to go.