Eastern Conference | Round 1 | (4) Philadelphia 76ers vs. (5) Toronto Raptors (PHI 3-2)

[cupcakesnake]

Pretty sure Collars admitted to tanking when he was with the raptors, also.

Hmmm I dont remember that. I can picture it in the Raps worst Colangelo years (2011 and 2012). Bosh left for Miami and the team was built around Bargnani and a young Derozan. The draft picks that came out of that were Valanciunas (#5) and T.Ross (#8). Hardly an expiring tank before making win-now moves: bringing in Lowry and Rudy Gay, while stubbornly holding onto his favorite son (Bargs).

I remember Bryan Longcollars Raptors' tenure mostly for its constant hit-or-miss win-now moves. Bringing in international players like Anthony Parker, Garbajosa, Calderon, (hits!), trading for an injured Jermaine O'Neal (miss), signing Turkoglu to pair with Bosh/Bargs, (miss!), Lowry (hit), Gay (miss). By in large he was a decent GM in Toronto, though it's fair to call him bad since enough of his moves didnt work out and he didnt elevate that franchise overall.

https://www.si.com/nba/2014/02/28/bryan-colangelo-toronto-raptors-tanking

Pretty sure the Raptors didn't try their hardest down the stretch last year either. Just happened to lose 10 of their last 11. We'll gladly take Barnes if Raptors fans feel gross about it.

There you have it. And no question the Raps tanked last year, something I assume every Raps fan is happy about. Most Sixers fans are pro-Hinkie in the big picture, right?

[Sixerscan]

Hmmm I dont remember that. I can picture it in the Raps worst Colangelo years (2011 and 2012). Bosh left for Miami and the team was built around Bargnani and a young Derozan. The draft picks that came out of that were Valanciunas (#5) and T.Ross (#8). Hardly an expiring tank before making win-now moves: bringing in Lowry and Rudy Gay, while stubbornly holding onto his favorite son (Bargs).

I remember Bryan Longcollars Raptors' tenure mostly for its constant hit-or-miss win-now moves. Bringing in international players like Anthony Parker, Garbajosa, Calderon, (hits!), trading for an injured Jermaine O'Neal (miss), signing Turkoglu to pair with Bosh/Bargs, (miss!), Lowry (hit), Gay (miss). By in large he was a decent GM in Toronto, though it's fair to call him bad since enough of his moves didnt work out and he didnt elevate that franchise overall.

https://www.si.com/nba/2014/02/28/bryan-colangelo-toronto-raptors-tanking

Pretty sure the Raptors didn't try their hardest down the stretch last year either. Just happened to lose 10 of their last 11. We'll gladly take Barnes if Raptors fans feel gross about it.

There you have it. And no question the Raps tanked last year, something I assume every Raps fan is happy about. Most Sixers fans are pro-Hinkie in the big picture, right?

Yeah, some people are cooler on him because of individual moves like taking Okafor, but basically everyone is on board with what he did. Probably could have handled the third offseason better to keep his job though. He tripled down on the awfulness when Embiid broke his foot the second time.

[goattted]

i'm just happy for the sixers fanbase and their first round playoff success thus far. After nearly 40 years (39 to be exact) of not having won a championship and 20 years without a conference final appearance. Also, losing to an eventual championship team by a few lucky bounces. Then getting swept in the playoffs and losing to a lower seed Hawks the years after. Not to mention missing out on Jaylen Brown and picking Fultz instead of Tatum and then having them land in division rival where the "what if" is only made more apparent by that teams' success.

Despite all this, they now have 1 of the greatest SGs of all time paired with arguably the best big of this generation. Moreover, an all-time winningest coach to boot.

Its sall good us mere Torontonians, while we suppress 01 and now this year, we'll always have 2019 and 1993 to give us comfort.

[cupcakesnake]

https://www.si.com/nba/2014/02/28/bryan-colangelo-toronto-raptors-tanking

Pretty sure the Raptors didn't try their hardest down the stretch last year either. Just happened to lose 10 of their last 11. We'll gladly take Barnes if Raptors fans feel gross about it.

There you have it. And no question the Raps tanked last year, something I assume every Raps fan is happy about. Most Sixers fans are pro-Hinkie in the big picture, right?

Yeah, some people are cooler on him because of individual moves like taking Okafor, but basically everyone is on board with what he did. Probably could have handled the third offseason better to keep his job though. He tripled down on the awfulness when Embiid broke his foot the second time.

The injuries to Embiid painted such an unfair perception. If I was the architect of The Process, and those injuries happened, I probably would have done the same thing, unless I was aware that the optics of such a move would lose me my job. Embiid being injured wasnt an opportunity to compete, an attempt to do so might have cost the Ben Simmons (or another top pick in that draft).

The Okafor pick sucked and not just in hindsight. I had Okafor 8th on my board that year and couldnt belive people were ready to invest a top 3 draft pick in him. To be fair I had Stanley Johnson 3rd, behind Kat and Porzingis, so I cant dunk on Hinkie too much there (though the Stanimal is at least still in the league!)

[Ballerhogger]

except the series to end today . Raptors had ok season all things considered.

[First Step]

Terrible news about Embiid. As much as I despise the 76ers and their pathetic tanking process, their GM using burner accounts to criticize players on his team, you still hate to see MVP talent get injured during the playoffs.

If you hate the sixers for their burner account using GM, then you hate the Raptors too. Bryan Colangelo has led both teams. Despising Colangelo should unite Sixers and Raptors fans, not divide them!

It doesn’t work like that. Raptors also had Hakeem Olajuwon on their team, but you’d be insane as a Raps fan to take credit for the body of work Olajuwon produced in a Rockets uniform. Respectfully, Raptors fans do not inherit the body of work Colangelo produced as a Sixer, (a job he got because of nepotism). Raptors Colangelo was EOY, and while he wasn’t the best GM when he was representing the Raptors, he didn’t embarrass our franchise like he did the 6ers. He made them the laughing stock of the league.

[sp6r=underrated]

My take on what Hinkie. He was great for Philadelphia 76ers long-term title odds and those focused on Philadelphia 76ers long-term odds. He was also very bad for the NBA as a whole.

His theory, spelled out below, is ~90% correct.
1. Superstars are the most important part of basketball teams.
2. Superstars are the hardest player to acquire
3. Teams can acquire them most easily in the draft.
4. The draft lottery odds (old ones) make intentionally losing games a good strategy for long-term title contention.
5. The best way to intentionally lose games isn't by having players intentionally play bad but intentionally acquiring bad players in the pre-season who will work hard but lack the ability to win.
6. NBA revenue sharing ensures your team can maintain profitability when intentionally losing because you can free ride off national revenues.

This was a great strategy for the Sixers and on a long-enough timeline would work for any team.

But it is a terrible strategy for the NBA stakeholders (all teams/players/business partners). Titles are zero sum competition. All Hinkie did was redistribute titles to Philadelphia.

His strategy incentivized:
1. The Sixers by point differential had the worst 3 year stretch in league history. They got a HOFer, a player who could still make the HOF (in Ben Simmons) and a lot of other top picks.
2. Other teams would look this and say we should adopt the Hinkie Model by gutting their rosters pre-season.
3. This creates more unmarketable games because NBA teams now had to sell regular season games against a Philadelphia roster that (i) were bad; (ii) had abnormally bad records and (ii) had players no one had ever heard of.
4. Sixers local tv ratings collapsed during the tank job. They were averaging 26k viewers at one point in one of the NBA largest markets. https://www.poughkeepsiejournal.com/story/sports/2014/12/02/ers-fans-hold-hope-losses-mount/19814531/
5. The Sixers strategy of not signing players above the league pissed off the players union because veterans couldn't get jobs.
6. The Sixers strategy of not caring about local revenue pissed off the other owners because they knew Philly was free riding off of national tv deals.
7. The Sixers strategy really pissed off the NBA's business partners who benefit from each team going all out.
8. If the Philly strategy spread to 4-5, NBA would have a significant revenue problem as the revenue loss from the tanking would be substantial on a year in year out basis even if those teams were maximizing their long-term title odds.

In short, Hinkie had a great strategy to increase the Sixers title odds. If I was a Philly focused on raising a banner in Philadelphia I'd applaud. But it was also a strategy that was really bad from an NBA perspective. I use NBA to refer to all the players, owners and business partners of the league.

He was costing them money. I don't think the NBA did enough but changing the odds and blacklisting Hinkie was required after the strategy was implemented and successful. If someone else tries it the NBA will need another round of reform.

[Mattatron]

Terrible news about Embiid. As much as I despise the 76ers and their pathetic tanking process, their GM using burner accounts to criticize players on his team, you still hate to see MVP talent get injured during the playoffs.

thats not changing the outcome of series anyway even without embiid.

lool good one

[SelfishPlayer]

The Sixers will get the predicted sweep today and move on to a test our championship caliber roster against a more competitive club.

[Mattatron]

Long term, I think Raps should replace both GTJ and FVV if they really want to be switchable on defense.

So you want them to eliminate guards entirely (as well as their 2 best shooters)? As far as switchable guards go, those 2 rate very highly. Trent is 6'6" (shoes) with a 6'9" wingspan. Fred is very stout against most matchups. Obviously forwards are inherently more switchable due to size, but a team needs to be able to do more than just switch on defense.

Even with Barnes out, this is arguably the most switchable team of all-time. They don't need to become more switchable, they need to shore up their primary weaknesses: rim pressure, backline defense, size at center, and shooting. I think the Raps knew all season they were short 1 rotation guard and 1 center. They chased centers hard at the trade deadline (Poetl, Nerlens Noel, Porzingis) before they settled for Thadd.

The Raps hoped they could fluster Embiid enough with their switching defense, but evidently clearly underestimated him. Even if they were even more switchable, it wouldn't have helped with this matchup. It's too important with Embiid to have at least 1 primary defender who can bother him. I bet the Raps continue their chase for a workable center this offseason. It's been their biggest problem since Gasol left.

@jamaalstar love reading your post's, alway nice to read #qualitycampaign

[cupcakesnake]

Long term, I think Raps should replace both GTJ and FVV if they really want to be switchable on defense.

So you want them to eliminate guards entirely (as well as their 2 best shooters)? As far as switchable guards go, those 2 rate very highly. Trent is 6'6" (shoes) with a 6'9" wingspan. Fred is very stout against most matchups. Obviously forwards are inherently more switchable due to size, but a team needs to be able to do more than just switch on defense.

Even with Barnes out, this is arguably the most switchable team of all-time. They don't need to become more switchable, they need to shore up their primary weaknesses: rim pressure, backline defense, size at center, and shooting. I think the Raps knew all season they were short 1 rotation guard and 1 center. They chased centers hard at the trade deadline (Poetl, Nerlens Noel, Porzingis) before they settled for Thadd.

The Raps hoped they could fluster Embiid enough with their switching defense, but evidently clearly underestimated him. Even if they were even more switchable, it wouldn't have helped with this matchup. It's too important with Embiid to have at least 1 primary defender who can bother him. I bet the Raps continue their chase for a workable center this offseason. It's been their biggest problem since Gasol left.

Yes getting a legit big was a problem for the Raptors and Khem Birch as much as I like him was not it. It didn't help that they outbid themselves by giving him a 3/20M deal when similar big men like Willie Hernangomez got a 3/7.5M(last year team option). If Birch's deal was a team option he'd have been far easier to move. When they settled for Thad and Josh Richardson was flipped there, I was hoping the Raps could've done something like this:

San Antonio: Khem Birch(if his last year was a team option it'd be far more feasible), Dragic, Bonga, TOR 22 1st, future 2nd
Toronto: Josh Richardson, Thaddeus Young, DET 2nd

-San Antonio would've shed salary for next year and Birch's deal would've expired at the same time as Collins and Dejounte's deal.
-Toronto badly needed a 2 guard off the bench to spell minutes for Trent Jr. when he needed rest. They'd have Young's bird rights and I would've loved to give him a 2/10-12M deal with a 3rd year being a player option to simply work with Barnes and Achiuwa as he's a solid vet, but wouldn't blame him for going elsewhere to get a ring. Plus J-Rich has one more year at 12M and could be flipped if need be. He's really excelled in a bench role as shown this past year in Boston/San Antonio

I wish they could've played Flynn more in a backup pg role even if it meant some short term pain in order to let him learn from his mistakes and save the wear and tear from Vanvleet while having Banton play in the g-league to develop his jump shot and have some confidence.

Honestly even though Embiid has been whipping them badly as he should, seeing Maxey killing them this easily has been brutal to see but honestly the 76ers are at a stage where they've endured the luxuries and heartache of playoff basketball and maybe they finally break through. I'd be happy for Danny Green and Embiid as Silver/league executives wouldn't be too happy with Hinkie's project finally succeeding(the Process). Seeing Harden win a ring before Brooklyn would be amusing.

Either way it's been fun seeing Scottie shine and Precious has left me impressed as I honestly thought he'd need at least 2 more years before showing progress. His FT shot needs work, but his 3pt shot has come along nicely and hopefully his BB IQ and decision making improves with more reps.

Honestly I had Philly in 6 as the Raptors inexperience outside the title core was gonna be a problem and Embiid was gonna steamroll them, but Maxey's emergence as a 2nd/3rd option has elevated them to a whole new level. If Harris can be consistent and give them 15/10 a game that'd be nice.

I understood the Birch thing at the time. He'd been a breath of fresh air after Aaron Baynes, and we got a glimpse of a functional Nick Nurse offense, with Birch's short roll passing really shining. I think, had he been healthier this season, the Raps would have had a bit more functional defense on the backline. I'm not sure I realized (at the time of the signing) how small Birch is. His broad shoulders and big head give him the vague appearance of a center, but the guy is under 230lbs. and no taller/longer than the Raps wings. He as undersized at center as anyone else in that rotation. Not sure if the Spurs would have done that trade or not, but I agree with your premise. Khem was never a cap smart deal, and having him injury prone this seasn made it basically a pointless spend.

I remember at the trade deadline, seeing a fake trade that had Eric Gordon heading to Toronto and thinking that move would pay off big time if the Raps missed the playoffs. Their complete lack of a third rotation guard was a strange and rare problem. I would have preffered to see a longer leash for Flynn (and/or Banton). But his complete lack of offensive functionlity was a bit shocking. He's a sturdy defender despite his size, but the Raps were wealthy in larger perimeter defenders. Flynn's only offensive ability was in catch & shoot, and he wasn't good enough there. He gets run off the line and becomes a non-threat. He cant get seperation for a pull up game, he's wildly erratic on floaters, and cant get to the rim and finish. There was just nothing positive Malachi could do. Until he gets a floater or some kind of counter in the midrange, he's a not a rotation player.

Second half of Precious was very encouraging for sure. Looks like a useful rotation player going forward with potential to be more.

[XtremeDunkz]

Terrible news about Embiid. As much as I despise the 76ers and their pathetic tanking process, their GM using burner accounts to criticize players on his team, you still hate to see MVP talent get injured during the playoffs.

I hope you're keeping that same energy for OKC and Houston.

Sent from my SM-G991U using Tapatalk

[XtremeDunkz]

My take on what Hinkie. He was great for Philadelphia 76ers long-term title odds and those focused on Philadelphia 76ers long-term odds. He was also very bad for the NBA as a whole.

His theory, spelled out below, is ~90% correct.
1. Superstars are the most important part of basketball teams.
2. Superstars are the hardest player to acquire
3. Teams can acquire them most easily in the draft.
4. The draft lottery odds (old ones) make intentionally losing games a good strategy for long-term title contention.
5. The best way to intentionally lose games isn't by having players intentionally play bad but intentionally acquiring bad players in the pre-season who will work hard but lack the ability to win.
6. NBA revenue sharing ensures your team can maintain profitability when intentionally losing because you can free ride off national revenues.

This was a great strategy for the Sixers and on a long-enough timeline would work for any team.

But it is a terrible strategy for the NBA stakeholders (all teams/players/business partners). Titles are zero sum competition. All Hinkie did was redistribute titles to Philadelphia.

His strategy incentivized:
1. The Sixers by point differential had the worst 3 year stretch in league history. They got a HOFer, a player who could still make the HOF (in Ben Simmons) and a lot of other top picks.
2. Other teams would look this and say we should adopt the Hinkie Model by gutting their rosters pre-season.
3. This creates more unmarketable games because NBA teams now had to sell regular season games against a Philadelphia roster that (i) were bad; (ii) had abnormally bad records and (ii) had players no one had ever heard of.
4. Sixers local tv ratings collapsed during the tank job. They were averaging 26k viewers at one point in one of the NBA largest markets. https://www.poughkeepsiejournal.com/story/sports/2014/12/02/ers-fans-hold-hope-losses-mount/19814531/
5. The Sixers strategy of not signing players above the league pissed off the players union because veterans couldn't get jobs.
6. The Sixers strategy of not caring about local revenue pissed off the other owners because they knew Philly was free riding off of national tv deals.
7. The Sixers strategy really pissed off the NBA's business partners who benefit from each team going all out.
8. If the Philly strategy spread to 4-5, NBA would have a significant revenue problem as the revenue loss from the tanking would be substantial on a year in year out basis even if those teams were maximizing their long-term title odds.

In short, Hinkie had a great strategy to increase the Sixers title odds. If I was a Philly focused on raising a banner in Philadelphia I'd applaud. But it was also a strategy that was really bad from an NBA perspective. I use NBA to refer to all the players, owners and business partners of the league.

He was costing them money. I don't think the NBA did enough but changing the odds and blacklisting Hinkie was required after the strategy was implemented and successful. If someone else tries it the NBA will need another round of reform.

The sixers more than made up for this years with their success afterwards. It was a 3 year tank for a 10 year title window. Now the sixers are huge nationally. I think the NBA made out fine.

Sent from my SM-G991U using Tapatalk

[sp6r=underrated]

The sixers more than made up for this years with their success afterwards. It was a 3 year tank for a 10 year title window. Now the sixers are huge nationally. I think the NBA made out fine.

Sent from my SM-G991U using Tapatalk

1. Embiid is the reason the Sixers are huge. And he would have been in the NBA even if Hinkie didn't exist. He'd be making the same amount of money for the NBA if he was wearing another team's jersey. Do you think Embiid would make less money for the NBA if he was in Detroit? Of course not, so Hinkie strategy didn't increase revenue.
2. There is revenue loss in 2012-14.
3. There would be even more revenue loss for the NBA if his strategy was adopted by 4-5 other teams.

He was bad for the NBA. I also acknowledge he was good for Philly fans but bad for the NBA.

[Sixerscan]

My take on what Hinkie. He was great for Philadelphia 76ers long-term title odds and those focused on Philadelphia 76ers long-term odds. He was also very bad for the NBA as a whole.

His theory, spelled out below, is ~90% correct.
1. Superstars are the most important part of basketball teams.
2. Superstars are the hardest player to acquire
3. Teams can acquire them most easily in the draft.
4. The draft lottery odds (old ones) make intentionally losing games a good strategy for long-term title contention.
5. The best way to intentionally lose games isn't by having players intentionally play bad but intentionally acquiring bad players in the pre-season who will work hard but lack the ability to win.
6. NBA revenue sharing ensures your team can maintain profitability when intentionally losing because you can free ride off national revenues.

This was a great strategy for the Sixers and on a long-enough timeline would work for any team.

But it is a terrible strategy for the NBA stakeholders (all teams/players/business partners). Titles are zero sum competition. All Hinkie did was redistribute titles to Philadelphia.

His strategy incentivized:
1. The Sixers by point differential had the worst 3 year stretch in league history. They got a HOFer, a player who could still make the HOF (in Ben Simmons) and a lot of other top picks.
2. Other teams would look this and say we should adopt the Hinkie Model by gutting their rosters pre-season.
3. This creates more unmarketable games because NBA teams now had to sell regular season games against a Philadelphia roster that (i) were bad; (ii) had abnormally bad records and (ii) had players no one had ever heard of.
4. Sixers local tv ratings collapsed during the tank job. They were averaging 26k viewers at one point in one of the NBA largest markets. https://www.poughkeepsiejournal.com/story/sports/2014/12/02/ers-fans-hold-hope-losses-mount/19814531/
5. The Sixers strategy of not signing players above the league pissed off the players union because veterans couldn't get jobs.
6. The Sixers strategy of not caring about local revenue pissed off the other owners because they knew Philly was free riding off of national tv deals.
7. The Sixers strategy really pissed off the NBA's business partners who benefit from each team going all out.
8. If the Philly strategy spread to 4-5, NBA would have a significant revenue problem as the revenue loss from the tanking would be substantial on a year in year out basis even if those teams were maximizing their long-term title odds.

In short, Hinkie had a great strategy to increase the Sixers title odds. If I was a Philly focused on raising a banner in Philadelphia I'd applaud. But it was also a strategy that was really bad from an NBA perspective. I use NBA to refer to all the players, owners and business partners of the league.

He was costing them money. I don't think the NBA did enough but changing the odds and blacklisting Hinkie was required after the strategy was implemented and successful. If someone else tries it the NBA will need another round of reform.

My problem with this is people always frame it like the plan was always for Embiid to miss two years. Him rebreaking his foot the second time was franchise altering. They basically gave up on the coming season when that happened. If he plays that second year they're probably just a normal bad team with a bright young star, and they really would have only outright "processed" for two years. Embiid is the kind of pick that can singlehandedly give a GM an extra couple of years of job security, but he had to actually get on the floor to do that.

The issue was because Embiid was injured Hinkie after 2+ years on the job had very little to show for himself in terms of actual 76ers basketball players. Dario was over in Europe, the 5 extra first round picks and unprotected swap with the Kings and countless 2nds that he had acquired hadn't conveyed yet, the guys that were playing that eventually became solid to good NBA players (Covington, Grant, Noel, Holmes, McConnell) were still young/raw/more secondary players. And so when they started out 0-20 or whatever it was it just seemed neverending and hopeless and then the league stepped in with the Colangelo's.

Even with the Embiid injury, if he even just like signed Ish Smith instead of Kendall Marshall, then maybe he weathers the storm of that year, and at that point Embiid and Dario are playing, you add Simmons or some other top 5 pick, two other 1st round picks that year. That was arguably his biggest mistake.

[slicedbread2]

The sixers more than made up for this years with their success afterwards. It was a 3 year tank for a 10 year title window. Now the sixers are huge nationally. I think the NBA made out fine.

Sent from my SM-G991U using Tapatalk

1. Embiid is the reason the Sixers are huge. And he would have been in the NBA even if Hinkie didn't exist. He'd be making the same amount of money for the NBA if he was wearing another team's jersey. Do you think Embiid would make less money for the NBA if he was in Detroit? Of course not, so Hinkie strategy didn't increase revenue.
2. There is revenue loss in 2012-14.
3. There would be even more revenue loss for the NBA if his strategy was adopted by 4-5 other teams.

He was bad for the NBA. I also acknowledge he was good for Philly fans but bad for the NBA.

Those are good points. I remembered Hinkie had wanted to draft Porzingis, but his camp was adamant about having him go to New York and he refused to give the 76ers a workout and Philly's ownership was scared of KP going Steve Francis on them so they settled on a dude who's game was 10 years too late in Okafor and the best case scenario for him was a Brook Lopez/Al Jefferson hybrid except he lacked maturity. The funny thing was they had the Heat's pick in that draft that was top 10 pro. and Miami was able to keep it and took Justise Winslow. In retrospect if they had gotten Miami's pick, maybe they take Devin Booker(honestly was impressed that Booker became so much more as I feared the Suns were gonna ruin him due to Sarver's incompetence).

Honestly the thing that probably resulted in the straw breaking the camel's back was the incident where Okafor got into a street fight in Boston and knocked out a fan resulting in the league forcing the 76ers to have a security guard with Okafor at all times after that. Apparently it was rumoured that Ainge was pondering about giving up the Brooklyn 1st that became Jaylen Brown for Okafor at the 2016 trade deadline but he was vetoed by the Colangelo cartel which is a damn shame in hindsight.

The other blunders he made were underestimating the players and their agents. This was where Presti succeeded whilst Hinkie failed at. If he had just signed a few journeymen to short term deals to placate the player's union maybe they wouldn't have made a huge fuss about things. It really sucked that Embiid missed 2.5 seasons due to setbacks in his rehab but those are the breaks and thankfully he made it through to become the player he is today.

If the 76ers had won the title in 2019, the league would be scared knowing that 1/3rd of the league would commence the tank to end all tanks.

[Sixerscan]

The sixers more than made up for this years with their success afterwards. It was a 3 year tank for a 10 year title window. Now the sixers are huge nationally. I think the NBA made out fine.

Sent from my SM-G991U using Tapatalk

1. Embiid is the reason the Sixers are huge. And he would have been in the NBA even if Hinkie didn't exist. He'd be making the same amount of money for the NBA if he was wearing another team's jersey. Do you think Embiid would make less money for the NBA if he was in Detroit? Of course not, so Hinkie strategy didn't increase revenue.
2. There is revenue loss in 2012-14.
3. There would be even more revenue loss for the NBA if his strategy was adopted by 4-5 other teams.

He was bad for the NBA. I also acknowledge he was good for Philly fans but bad for the NBA.

Didn't you just say the Sixers being bad was especially bad for the league with it being a bigger market? No I don't think the Pistons do the same ratings or merchandise numbers when they are good. The Sixers having this prolonged stretch of good basketball has been great for the league. Would take a more complex analysis to tell whether it was in the aggregate a net positive, it will probably come down to how long this run lasts. At this point we are at 5 years of reliable playoff teams versus 3 years of Hinkie.

And keep in mind that team probably would have been bad regardless of the GM for a bit just because of the situation it was in when Hinkie took over. Jrue Holiday leading a team to a 10 seed isn't printing cash.

In terms of other teams adopting it, that explains why they changed the rules to disincentive what Hinkie did, less so putting a professional hit on the guy.

[sp6r=underrated]

My problem with this is people always frame it like the plan was always for Embiid to miss two years. Him rebreaking his foot the second time was franchise altering. They basically gave up on the coming season when that happened.
.
.
.
And so when they started out 0-20 or whatever it was it just seemed neverending and hopeless and then the league stepped in with the Colangelo's.

I agree if Embiid doesn't break his foot he starts trying hard. And him giving up on seasons before they begin only last two years. He had gotten his generational star and would now try to build.

But say Embiid turned out to be a bust or an MCW level player or an Oden type who just can't stay healthy despite considerable talent. I do think Hinkie quickly pivots back to the full tank for multiple seasons if necessary.

To put it another way the impression I got from Hinkie and Sixers owners were they were comfortable with indefinite 2012-14 level basketball until they landed a generational player. If you disagree let me know, as I think this is a key point.

If that mindset was adopted by other franchises it would be extremely bad for the NBA.

[sp6r=underrated]

And as said I think his strategy worked. If I was a Sixer fan I'd be fine with it. Process fans were right that what Philly was doing was good for Philly but it doesn't mean it was good for the NBA.

A good parallel is the Bad Boys Pistons. Prior to the Bad Boys, the NBA had no flagrant fouls. Daly and crew recognized this created a huge advantage for teams that were willing to play very dirty.

It worked for Detroit. It got them 3 straight final appearances, 2 titles and should have been 3 but for the phantom foul which is the worst call in NBA history.

But it was terrible for the NBA. The Bad Boys Pistons encouraged a lot of teams to pivot to an ugly style of play. It was a major factor in why basketball became progressively more physical and unwatachable in the 90s.

The NBA eventually killed that style of ball through multiple rule changes. The lottery draft odds change was quite similar in that Hinkie found a loophole used it, benefited his club but also caused the NBA systemic problems in doing so.

[Sixerscan]

My problem with this is people always frame it like the plan was always for Embiid to miss two years. Him rebreaking his foot the second time was franchise altering. They basically gave up on the coming season when that happened.
.
.
.
And so when they started out 0-20 or whatever it was it just seemed neverending and hopeless and then the league stepped in with the Colangelo's.

I agree if Embiid doesn't break his foot he starts trying hard. And him giving up on seasons before they begin only last two years. He had gotten his generational star and would now try to build.

But say Embiid turned out to be a bust or an MCW level player or an Oden type who just can't stay healthy despite considerable talent. I do think Hinkie quickly pivots back to the full tank for multiple seasons if necessary.

To put it another way the impression I got from Hinkie and Sixers owners were they were comfortable with indefinite 2012-14 level basketball until they landed a generational player. If you disagree let me know, as I think this is a key point.

If that mindset was adopted by other franchises it would be extremely bad for the NBA.

I think the owners would have eventually lost patience after 4-5 years. He was on the job less than 3 years, the only way GMs usually don't get longer than that is if they have some sort of personal scandal.