The Top 50 Moments When It All Went Wrong For The Process: An RTRS Staff List
Relitigation and blame is what we do best.
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With the Philadelphia 76ers' post-Bubble present in shambles and their future looking uncertain at best, the only place to turn for answers is the past. So we're going to do what we do best here at the Rights to Ricky Sanchez: point fingers, assign blame, and relitigate everything.
Thus, our staff countdown of the top 50 moments where it all went wrong for The Process -- the bad trades, the freak injuries, the unforgettable losses and the unforgivable personnel moves that led us from the promising collection of young talent and high-upside assets we once had to the third-act existentialist drama that we're currently watching unfold. Read our list below and get angry a few dozen times all over again. What else are you going to do, watch Raptors-Celtics?
50. Joel Embiid shushes the home crowd (Feb. 9, 2020)
Nothing alienates fans like an acknowledgment that criticism and pushback between home crowds and players can, in fact, be a two-way street. Got ugly quickly, and could've gotten much uglier if the Sixers lost again at the WFC at any point in the remainder of the 2019-20 season. -- ANDREW UNTERBERGER
49. Jahlil Okafor traded, then not actually traded (Feb. 2017)
Trade heat was so hot around Big Jah before the 2017 deadline -- he was going to Portland, he was going to Chicago, he was going to New Orleans -- that he actually sat a couple games as the Sixers presumably worked out the fine print on one of those deals. Instead, he went nowhere, preserving the logjam at the Sixers' center position, which the team ultimately resolved with a handful of terrible decisions that worked out well for nobody. -- AU
48. Al Horford and Tobias Harris no-show Game Two against Boston (Aug. 19, 2020)
A potentially pivotal Game Two win may have been within the Sixers' grasp early against Boston this year, thanks to a hot shooting start and a dominant first half from Joel Embiid. But Embiid got none of the offensive help he needed to preserve the team's early lead, particularly from his highest-paid co-stars -- combined 17 points on 6-18 shooting on the night from Horf and Harris -- and the team let go of the rope midway through the second quarter, effectively dooming the series. -- AU
47. Richaun Holmes traded to Phoenix for cash (Jul. 20, 2018)
Sure, Richaun was the bouncy rim runner this team has been needing for decades. Sure he got the developmental time he needed in Phoenix and blossomed to a legit player in Sacramento. But the takeaway from this moment is how much I love selling shit for cash. One of my favorite things. I think these owners should sell more shit for cash. The whole organization, even. -- MIKE LEVIN
46. Sixers sell the farm on 2019 draft night (Jun. 20, 2019)
Over/under on guys who are going to randomly become future All-Stars from the second round of this draft just to make us look extra dumb for punting on so many potential late picks for extra Penn's Landing pocket change: 3.5, maybe? Admiral Schofield and Talen Horton-Tucker are definitely two of them, tell you that much. -- AU
45. Zhaire Smith breaks foot, then nearly dies of a sesame injury (Aug. 6, 2018)
Most team rookie curses would be satisfied with one season-ending injury as blood sacrifice, but Zhaire Smith almost gave his life to appease the Process Gods. His karma still hasn't totally recovered, and probably won't until he's putting up 19-8-4 for the Hawks in 2023 after we trade him for a retired Vince Carter. -- AU
44. Joel Embiid shut out by Toronto (Nov. 25, 2019)
Hopes that motivation from a long offseason after underperforming against Toronto, being eliminated by them in seven games, and then watching them win the championship would be enough to elevate Joel Embiid's play against the Toronto Raptors quickly proved to be, uh, not quite realistic. That 0 on Jo's Basketball-Reference game log still haunts me. -- AU
43. Tobias Harris takes a hard fall, Sixers get swept by Boston (Aug. 23, 2020)
We knew it was all over by then anyway -- but one win and we probably could've convinced ourselves otherwise for at least a couple days. Then Tobias' head bounced off the hardwood, the team ran out of gas and so did we. -- AU
42. Nemanja Bjelica changes his mind (Jul. 17, 2018)
Bjelica signed with Philly to be our shooty combo forward off the bench, then decided to go back to Serbia instead, then found the Call of the Vlade too strong and re-routed to Sacramento, where he's improbably enjoyed the two most productive seasons of his career. At least once following our 2019 playoff elimination, I workshopped a "but if we had Bjelica..." grievance. I'll boo him forever. -- AU
41. Sixers telegraph their interest in Matisse Thybulle to the Celtics (Jun. 20, 2019)
Matisse Thybulle, lovely young man, truly, left nothing to the imagination when he let us know after the 2019 NBA Draft that he didn’t work out for anyone because he had gotten a promise from the Sixers. Ever the collaborative brain trust, the Sixers held that secret about as well as I eat just one Insomnia cookie. Not only did the rumor permeate within league circles quickly, Danny Ainge got hold of it and made sure Elton Brand and crew knew that he knew and boy did it cost them -- to the tune of the 33rd pick, which if they had held on and drafted a serviceable player, would have come very much in handy during an offseason where this team has an abundance of holes to fill and an empty war chest to do it with. -- ALONZO JONES
40. Ben Simmons scores one point against Boston in Game Two (May 4, 2018)
"If they'd had Simmons against the Celtics in that series, they definitely would've won," you say to yourself. And then you remember this graphic.
-- AU
39. Amir Johnson caught with phone on bench against Nets in Game One (Mar. 28, 2019)
This moment was the perfect example of how everything that can go wrong, does go wrong for the Sixers. While getting shellacked by the Nets in Game 1 of the first round -- a game in which Joel Embiid returned from injury and looked like a shell of himself -- this moment added some additional, non-basketball embarrassment to the mix. Also, every great Sixers scandal involves someone sneakily using their phone for something and getting caught. -- MIKE O’CONNOR
38. Sixers trade for the corpse of Wilson Chandler (July 6, 2018)
That they dealt for dead guy -- not a cheap dead guy either -- and couldn't even get a first-rounder back for the privilege was probably a good early sign that Team Collaborative GM wasn't going to be getting the better of many trades around the margins for the foreseeable future. -- AU
37. Front office kicks Brett out the door via obvious dumb leaks (Aug. 23-24, 2020)
Sorry Brett -- can never say we didn't give you plenty of Trevor Bookers and Jerryd Baylesses to work with. -- AU
36. Greg Monroe starts a game in the playoffs (Apr. 18, 2019)
They won this game, actually -- one of the best wins of the 2019 postseason, in fact. But the fact that Greg Monroe was somehow really our best backup option for an inactive Joel Embiid probably shoulda showed how screwed we would be in the next round whenever Jo had to take a bathroom break. -- AU
35. Sixers shoot under 30% from the field in Game Three against Boston (Aug. 21, 2020)
I'll say it again, after I check the box score for the 27th time to once again confirm that this wasn't a fever dream caused by my pizza delivery guy that Friday giving me the MJ-in-Utah treatment: Joel Embiid went 7-20 from the field in this one -- one brick away from missing twice as many as he made -- and he still easily had the best shooting percentage of anyone on the team. Ha ha, it is to laugh. -- AU
34. Jimmy Butler fights with Brett Brown after a loss (Dec. 2018)
I'm not right about everything, but I'm right about some things. You see, the thing about Jimmy Butler isn't that he's not good. He's good! It's that he's a total asshole who thinks he's the point guard. There are even quotes from him that say "I'm a total asshole who thinks he's the point guard," or something close enough. So it wasn't all that surprising that Jimmy was an asshole who wanted the ball. We look back and think "maybe Jimmy was right, maybe he should have had the ball more than Ben." So he was right, and an asshole. Looks like we've got something in common. -- SPIKE ESKIN
33. Sixers trade Jahlil Okafor, Nik Stauskas and a pick for Trevor Booker (Feb. 28, 2018)
I'm just glad that I had enough personal investment in this one that I never in any way tried to talk myself into the benefits of the Sixers trading two top 10 overall picks still on their rookie contracts -- and then another second-rounder on top of that, why not -- for a guy who saved us no money and had no chance of being a contributor to our playoff rotation (and in fact was cut long before then anyway). Always rewarding when your pettiness saves you from your insanity. -- AU
32. Sixers trade Mikal Bridges for Zhaire Smith and a future Miami 1st (June 21, 2018)
Totally logical trade, but boy, did it suck at the time ditching the hometown kid for a complete unknown in Zhaire Smith. Also, it’d sure be nice to have a player like Bridges right about now! -- MOC
31. Sixers trade Jimmy Butler for Josh Richardson (July 1, 2019)
Did they have a choice? Could they have maxed him out without losing Ben and/or Brett? Should they have done it anyway? Were they unwilling to do it regardless? Still reasonable questions to ponder, but we may only be starting to see how much they're gonna continue to haunt this franchise -- particularly if Jimothy's oh-so-subtle recruitment efforts of JoJo to MIA prove to be more than just Twitter and IG smoke. -- AU
30. Joel Embiid gets gastroenteritis (Apr. 29, 2019)
Would Embiid have been effective enough to get us past Toronto without the tummy rumbles that ailed him throughout the Sixers' second-round series last season? Based on his healthier performances against Marc Gasol since then, probably not. Would it at least have saved us a couple truly shitty days of Twitter and radio idiots demanding we trade Jo because he couldn't watch his diet? Also maybe not! Nothing good and logical is ever totally secure with this team. -- AU
29. Ben Simmons fucks up his knee in the Bubble restart (Aug. 6, 2020)
Maybe he wouldn't have been effective anyway, maybe he didn't want to be there in the first place, maybe his season was just always going to end badly. I still really could've used a couple extra weeks of at least having some modicum of hope that this team was going to figure things out in time. Unsurprising but darn cruddy that even that turned out to be too much to ask. -- AU
28. Sixers trade Jerami Grant for Ersan Ilyasova (Nov. 1, 2016)
Bryan could've made this trade with his eyes closed. There were too many Hinkie Guys here, and our little fella was just dying to get rid of some. They wouldn't let him touch the prized merchandise, but with the "Raw Big Man" slot overflowing with limbs, Jerami was that sacrifice. At the time, I didn't mind it too much -- I'm happy Jerami got to develop elsewhere, and Ersan did provide some weird joy for us. But with the benefit of hindsight, this was our first example that Bryan's guiding GM ethos was spite. -- ML
27. Sixers trade Timothé Luwawu-Cabarrot for Mike Muscala (Jul. 25, 2018)
No yeah, didn't hurt at all to see TLC being the rangy, sweet-shooting, athletic forward we most needed against Boston for his new playoff team in Brooklyn, and then going on Basketball-Reference to discover that the player we gave up on him to acquire was Spencer Hawes' useless younger brother Mike Muscala. Can't imagine why a couple dozen seemingly small-sized miscalculations like that could have doomed this franchise to four games of watching Tobias Harris and Furkan Korkmaz rotating off the wrong man, again. -- AU
26. Sixers trade Dario Saric and Robert Covington for Jimmy Butler (Nov. 12, 2018)
I'll never forget where I was: on stage, in a park in Delco, hosting a costume contest for dogs, when a few Ricky devotees who were watching shouted at me, "Hey Spike, we traded for Butler!" I asked who we traded, "RoCo and Dario!" I started cursing into the mic, on stage, while a dog who was dressed like Cinderella was brought up on stage for the "best kiss" segment of the contest. This was followed by a Colony Meadery sponsored happy hour after the event where I motherfucked the entire deal -- and Fultz -- to everyone who would listen. I know that very little of this is about the trade itself, but "the Sixers would be better off if they never made the trade," is a very short write-up. -- SE
25. Sixers trade up in the draft for Anžejs Pasečņiks (June 22, 2017)
As if it wasn't bad enough that the Sixers traded up in the draft to take a stiff we all knew was never even gonna play in the pros -- bypassing a bunch of guys I'm not gonna bother reminding myself about, but trust that you've heard of them and that most are probably still playing in the playoffs right now -- the guy actually ended up making it to the NBA after all once the Wizards got him. Just to be a jerk. -- AU
24. Jahlil Okafor fights the city of Boston (Nov. 25, 2015)
I have been to one Sixers vs. Celtics game in Boston. I almost got into a fight, and then my wife almost fought several Boston fans who were taunting me as I sat helpless in my Jrue Holiday hoodie after the Celtics eliminated the Sixers in 2012. I then almost got into a fight with Boston fans in Aruba on my honeymoon, at a sports bar, while I watched the Eagles lose to the Cardinals in 2014.
Jahlil Okafor got in a fight with a bunch of Celtics fans on a cool night in November in 2015 after the Sixers blew a game. The losses were mounting, the fans were being assholes, and they kind of were asking for it. In any other context, we'd be celebrating a Sixers player fighting Celtics fans. In this context though, Okafor stunk, the team stunk, and if this never happened Hinkie might still be the GM. Right fight, wrong guy, even wronger time. -- SE
23. Sixers trade Nerlens Noel for a fake draft pick (Feb. 23, 2017)
I've been so preoccupied the last few years with finding time amidst the winning to still get angry at the Sixers for trading Nerlens Noel for Justin Anderson, a first-round pick that had no chance of conveying, and an Andrew Bogut that had even less chance of conveying -- after [Mike podcast voice] Noel and Embiid shared the court for just eight minutes of ball together -- that I've neglected my responsibilities in getting mad about it while the team is losing. Unacceptable, and I promise to be better in the future. -- AU
22. The Confetti Game goes bad (May 5, 2018)
They swept up the premature blast from the WFC floor, the Sixers went up four in OT with a minute to go -- and then Jayson Tatum, Al Horford, Al Horford again, and the game, the series, and arguably the Sixers' best chance of getting out of the East were all over. Watching this game live from the upper deck, I was reminded why I don't see horror movies in the theaters. -- AU
21. Brett starts Markelle in the first half, JJ in the second half (Oct. 2018)
Starting lineups don't matter. I don't care about them. But this insane weeks-long decision made by ~COLLABORATION~ was a tripling-down on the decision-making that led them to trade up for Markelle in the first place. I have always had a hard time blaming them for drafting Markelle (perfect fit, imagine ignoring years of tape for a couple bad workouts! fuck!), but what they did afterwards -- acting like maybe if they just squeeze their scrotums hard enough, Markelle would be the guy they thought he was -- has to be criticized. This moment revealed everything that was wrong with the Sixers organizational structure in one lineup choice. And benching the best shooter they had in favor of another guy who likes to operate around 8 feet was a devastating sign of things to come. -- ML
20. Nerlens Noel starts subtweeting Michael Carter-Williams (Mar. 31, 2015)
We've always been obsessed with Sixers players being friends, and the supposed Nerlens and MCW friendship that existed may have been the start of it. They played AAU together, and Noel himself, maybe also obsessed with the same thing, talked about his relationship with Carter-Williams the night that he was drafted. Imagine our shock when Nerlens said of Ish Smith, “I love that kid. He just finds me whenever I’m open and honestly, he’s the first true point-guard I’ve ever really played with. And you know, he said I’m one of the alley-oop men -- big men -- he’s played with. So I think we compliment each other so well.” MCW had just been traded days before. Nerlens didn't even wait till the body was cold. -- SE
19. Embiid Plays Through Meniscus Tear (Jan. 20-27, 2017)
It was the best of times, it was... I don't know, still the best of times? Joel Embiid was real, and he was spectacular. After centuries of waiting, the Sixers were actually good. It was January 2017, and it would only get worse from there. On the 20th of that month Joel Embiid seemingly came in and out of the game 15 times, young Willis Reed style, with the same knee issue. The Sixers would eventually emerge victorious on a Robert Covington game-winner. Jo would miss three games, but continue to practice, as the team just could not figure out why his knee kept swelling. He returned a week later for a nationally televised game against James Harden's Rockets, with an unbeknownst-to-us torn meniscus. It was the last game he'd play that season. It was the end of our innocence. Godner broke the story, and our hearts. -- SE
18. The Sixers let JJ Redick walk (July 1, 2019)
Redick leaving IMMEDIATELY at the beginning of free agency after talking extensively about wanting to spend the rest of his career here was a true shock, and a sign of the dominoes that were to tumble from there in what's turned out to be the most disastrous free agency period in modern Sixers history. Letting JJ (a player who complements Embiid perfectly and was one of his best friends on the team) walk in order to give an over-the-hill backup center nine figures accelerated the demise of The Process tenfold. -- MOC
17. Brett Brown names Ben Simmons starting point guard (Dec. 1, 2016)
Ben Simmons is not a point guard — not now, anyway. He's also not a center or a power forward or a small forward, but he's sure as shit not a point guard. Naming him as one was an admirable, if awkward, attempt by Simmons and Brown to utilize Simmons' unique skill set, and launch his star brand in the NBA -- even if it meant announcing (or at least implying) that JJ Redick was somehow our small forward. To this day, Brett's announcement has prevented the Sixers from building a real backcourt. Well, that and an obscene amount of unrelated organizational incompetence. -- SE
16. Sixers sign a bunch of lousy placeholder free agents (Jul. 9-13, 2017)
The most remarkable thing about Bryan Colangelo's free agency spending spree in the summer of 2017 -- cashing in all our clipped coupons on the kind of vetty-vet-vet free agents Sam Hinkie never wasted time pandering with -- wasn't just how uninspired all his selections were, it's how solidly but unspectacularly they failed to meet even the modest goals they may have had for them. None of Sergio Rodriguez, Gerald Henderson or Jerryd Bayless ever punched a teammate, flipped off the fans or got arrested for wearing a Patriots jersey in public -- but S-Rod couldn't crack 40% from the field, Gerald the II disintegrated into a fine powder sometime in late December, and the greatest gift ol' Meatballs ever gave us was giving us the chance to boo him in garbage time of a Wolves blowout in 2018 after we'd traded him to Minnesota. -- AU
15. Sixers win 16 games in a row to throw off everyone's expectations (Mar. 15 - Apr. 11, 2018)
It was the impossible high just before the movie starts to get really dark: For essentially an entire month of basketball games, the Sixers just eliminated losing from their repertoire. Was it an extremely easy end-of-season schedule? An unsustainable hot streak fueled by the late-season arrivals of shooting forwards Ersan Ilyasova and Marco Belinelli (and a temporarily convenient broken face for Joel Embiid)? Just a random-ass "even a stopped calendar tells the right month once a year" coinkydink? No, we/I decided at the time: It's because the Sixers had simply realized that they were the best team in the NBA and would be unstoppable from then on -- and should start wheeling and dealing like a team on the precipice of a dynasty, not as a flawed young team in their first year of really playing together. Could've happened! -- AU
14. Joel Embiid breaks his foot a second time (Jul. 20, 2015)
Had Embiid not broken his foot, perhaps the Sixers don’t draft Okafor, which probably means they never would’ve fired Hinkie,. And then this whole thing takes a wildly different path. -- MOC
13. Burnergate (May 28, 2018)
On the plus side, it rid the franchise of all Colangelos and revealed the true power of Sixers Twitter. On the minus side, it compromised the Sixers at a pivotal moment in their team-building, left Bryan and Jerry's tendrils in the organization via their various left-in-place lieutenants, and gave Joel Embiid reason No. 127 to trust precisely no one that’s ever been involved with the Sixers organization whose name doesn't rhyme with Jam Slinky. -- AU
12. Sixers sign Al Horford (July 1, 2020)
The Sixers being bullish enough on Horford -- again, a 33-year-old who had just crumbled along with the rest of his old team in the playoffs, and who played the same position as our best player -- to offer him $109 million was the nail in the coffin here. Had they instead used their open cap to sign, say, Malcolm Brogdon, Khem Birch, and Wayne Ellington, this team would currently make a zillion times more sense. -- MOC
11. Sixers extend Tobias Harris (July 1, 2020)
Of course, the Sixers had already put themselves in a situation where they pretty much had to resign Tobias Harris -- more on that to come, obv. But also, like... maybe they didn't? Maybe when other teams are willing to pay $180 million for a guy who will never be a top 30 player and doesn't even fit what your team is all that well, you should just kinda let them instead of going "NUH UH GOT HERE FIRST!" Maybe throwing good money after the bad money that you already threw at the other bad money isn't the model way to conduct business? Maybe next time, just try to think of a smarter team and ask yourself what they would do? -- AU
10. The quadruple-doink (May 12, 2019)
I don't think the Sixers were the better team. I don't think that they would have won in overtime. I don't think they would've beaten a healthy Warriors team in the finals. But man would I have loved the chance to have been proven wrong about any of that, and man would I love to be free of the memory of going from nope to well maybe to ah FUCK to yeahhhhh fuuuuuck over the course of four world-freezing caroms. -- AU
9. Elton Brand hired, rest of front office sticks around (Sept. 18, 2018)
What an insanely unjustifiable move it was to retain the front office of a man who trashed his players on social media -- and after they’d already had two years of doing precisely nothing beneficial for the team under their belt. They were so set on retaining them, in fact, that they wouldn’t even hire someone with true authority over them. They hired Elton simply to be the public face of their bullshit collaborative setup. Absolutely inexcusable. -- MOC
8. Brett Brown prompts Ben Simmons to shoot a three a game, he stops shooting altogether (Dec. 7, 2019 - present)
I don't know that there's a right way for a coach to get the idea through to Ben and Joel that they actually, eventually have to do what people have been telling them to do forever. I don't know what it is. But a very frustrated and out-of-ideas Brett going to the media to ask, all but ensuring a continuous stretch of fuck-that-noise play from Ben for the rest of the season? Wasn't it! -- ML
7. Sixers strike out star-hunting in the offseason (July 2018)
Do you remember a time when the Sixers were considered a serious contender to land LeBron? Like, LeBron James? In the offseason, for free? Neither does LeBron, probably -- he's too busy chuckling while remembering that time he made a high-larious press conference crack about Twitter burner accounts at the height of Burnergatemania. We were probably always delusional thinking we could be that kind of free agency destination with our degree of internal dysfunction, but the feeling that we should have been -- right away -- certainly led to team overextending itself in a pretty big way over the season that followed, trying to chase that additional talent payout we’d already promised ourselves. -- AU
6. Sixers blow Game Four at home against Toronto (May 5, 2019)
Real Process Trusters know that far more than Game Seven, this was the game we let get away. Up 2-1 at home, with the Raptors semi-shook and the Sixers leading for much of the fourth, all the Sixers had to do was execute down the stretch and not let Kawhi Leonard hit insane shots to take a commanding 3-1 series lead that even they probably (maybe?) wouldn't have blown. They can be forgiven for their inability to stop Kawhi being Kawhi -- much better teams than ours have tried and failed -- but their own late-game sputtering was a much tougher pill to swallow, particularly that clanked corner three for Tobias wide open in the corner that could've at least kept things spicy late. As a game that should've been much more winnable than Game 7 in Toronto, it's the biggest four-quarter What If in Process history. -- AU
5. Sixers draft Jahlil Okafor with the No. 3 pick (Jun. 25, 2015)
This pick was like watching a car crash over and over -- and the car was crashing into me. With every passing refresh of Twitter, I was growing more unhinged, pleading for news of a trade to break. Surely, even if Sam was pressured into signing this post-up fossil who was only playable on, what, 10% of the 94-foot court, surely he wouldn't hold onto him. But despite whatever behind-the-scenes chicanery, Hinkie must own the fact that he took the reservation, and then he *held* the reservation. This is the only time in my life I had a migraine. I threw up on myself the next morning. So did the Sixers. -- ML
4. Fultz flops in Sixers workout, they trade up and pick him No. 1 anyway. (Jun. 17, 2017)
I mean, they had to know. After they talked to the kid, they had to know. Who the fuck shoots like that? How did this happen? Couldn't just be a normal bust. Had to string us along and, man, fuck. -- SE
3. Sixers trade for Tobias Harris (Feb. 6, 2019)
Let's ignore for a second that the Sixers bid against themselves to overpay in assets for a non-star player, whose team had no need for him, and who they we then going to have to overpay for in cash and cap space immediately afterwards to keep around. Let's focus on the reasons the Sixers made the trade in the first place: because they thought it solidified them as title contenders that season (they finished as the three seed and Harris underperformed in the playoffs) and because they wanted insurance against Jimmy Butler walking in the offseason (Harris wasn't never nearly as good a player or a fit as Butler, but still cost far more to re-sign). Bad process, bad results, bad organization. -- AU
2. Jerry Colangelo hired as president of basketball operations (Dec. 7, 2015)
I remember, with great shame, talking myself into it. Jerry will handle the relationships with agents and the league and other stodgy teams so Hinkie can keep doing what he was doing!!!!!!!!!!! No. Bad. Galaxy brain dingusness. The NBA ramming a Colangelo down our throat should've been enough of an indication that our head was cut off, we just didn't know it yet. With any of these entries, we could go down the "what if" rabbit hole, but no more than this one. Jerry torpedoed the franchise's momentum, kneecapped the organizational competence with crotchety shiv thrusts in all directions, and of course, took over the team via Skype, hired his son, and ran away. I don't know what the world would look like if the NBA didn't regime-change the Colangelo Corruption Empire into Philadelphia, but I know it would be better than this one. -- ML
1. Sam Hinkie ousted, Jerry Colangelo hires his son to replace him (Apr. 6 - Apr. 10, 2016)
Even after Hinkie became a lame duck, it still would’ve been possible for ownership to install a high-functioning front office to take his place. It was an attractive job, surely, with all of the assets that Hinkie collected -- Embiid, RoCo, Dario, the pick that would soon become Ben Simmons, the Kings pickswap that would land at No. 3 in the draft to come, and the cleanest books a rebuilding team could ask for. Instead, they conducted a sham search that ended with Jerry hiring his son, who then hired a bunch of guys who turned Hinkie’s treasure trove of bonus picks, prospects and cap space into Tobias Harris and Al Horford on max contracts. Now, we're stuck with a lifetime of arguing with morons who say The Process failed the Sixers -- when it was already clear four years ago that it was the Sixers who failed The Process. -- MOC