Don't Forget About George Hill, Process Enemy
If there’s anything we truly need, it’s more enemies.
Andrew Unterberger is a famous writer who invented the nickname 'Sauce Castillo' and is now writing for The Rights To Ricky Sanchez, as part of the 'If Not, Pick Will Convey As Two Second-Rounders' section of the site. You can follow Andrew on Twitter @AUGetoffmygold and can also read him at Billboard.
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I sports-disliked George Hill for a long time before he got to Philadelphia. Nothing personal, I just found his seeming propensity to have big games and big shots -- against us or other teams I was invested in for whatever reason -- grating, especially after he had already seemed washed at one or two stops on his now-journeyman's NBA career. Of course, I can't recall any of those big games or big shots with any degree of specificity, aside from the one that slayed the Sixers in their crushing second-round Game Five loss to the Bucks in the 2020 J.J. Redick timeline playoffs. But the fact that it was him who hit that shot should tell you all you need to know about my general impression of George Hill.
Good, then, to get him on our side for once. By the time of last year's trade deadline, Hill was maybe at the stage of his career where he only really tried when he was on a time that actually had a chance of winning; fine, that was ostensibly the Sixers after they captured the No. 1 seed at the end of last year's regular season. I didn't expect George Hill to be the savior who elevated our championship odds from "not bloody likely" to "medium-bloody likely," but I thought he'd have a big playoff game or two, be that guy who gets the other team's fans cursing his name and swearing he shot 9-10 for 25 points when really he went 4-7 for 11. Spoiler alert, in case you're still saving the Sixers' first two postseason rounds on DV-R for when the Phillies' quest for .500 has reached its fruition: didn't happen.
I guess he scored double digits twice -- both in the Wizards series, once in the opening win and once in the Game Four loss -- but I don't think he would've made too many Washington fans' Top 5 Most Cursed lists for either. Meanwhile, his overall shooting for the playoffs was, on paper, acceptable: 44% / 42% / 77% for the series. He shot 1-5 in one game against the Hawks, but didn't have any of those John Starks-type signature stinkfests that would show up on his Wikipedia page or anything. In fact, here's how Wiki currently summarizes George Hill's tenure in Philadelphia: "On March 25, 2021, Hill was traded to the Philadelphia 76ers. On August 3, he was waived by the 76ers." Accurate!
Don't let the seeming inconspicuousness of his stay in Philadelphia fool you, though: George Hill's time as a Sixer proves that he is an Enemy of the Process -- likely always was -- and should be remembered as such. He is not No. 1 on the list of scapegoats for Philly's premature playoff exit -- we all know that man's name -- and he is probably not number two, either. He might not be number three, but now we're getting into legit argument territory. If he's not at least appearing a spot or two below that for you, you might not have watched the same playoffs I did. (And there you go: I guess George Hill is still making fans' Top 5 Most Cursed lists, it's just for the home team this time.)
What did George Hill do that was so terrible? Nothing, really, and I'm sure he was a totally likeable teammate and locker room guy and probably doesn't even need Facebook to remember his friends' birthdays. It was of course, more about what he didn't do -- which, really, was anything. That 1-5 game against the Hawks? It was one of five straight games that series -- five! -- where Hill made exactly 1 field goal. His shooting lines were as such: 0-2, 2-4, 1-3, 1-3, 1-5, 1-3, 1-3. Of those 7 total makes from 23 total attempts, he went 2-9 from three. He shot three total free throws and made one of them. Across 110 minutes played against the Hawks, he scored 17 points -- a resounding scoring rate of 5.6 points per 36 minutes with a True Shooting % of 35. (Famous one-way player Matisse Thybulle, by comparison, scored 10.1 points per 36 with a 64.8 TS% in the series.) It was a truly spectacular no-show from a guy who could've very easily gotten away with being only slightly underwhelming.
In retrospect, we probably should've taken it as a sign when, about a week after the Sixers traded three second-round picks for him and Daryl Morey proclaimed "I don't want to give a timeline [for his return], but it's not long," Doc Rivers answered a question about his potential Sixers debut coming soon with an answer that was halfway between "ehh I wouldn't hold my breath" and "George who?" George Hill came back before season's end, and even looked like he was rounding into game shape in spots. But the impact player never really arrived -- he just kinda drifted through games, making plays when he absolutely had to but always looking like he'd rather be chillin'. I would never feel comfortable making (or researching) an explicit reference to I Think You Should Leave but I'm pretty sure there's a meme that involves the guy screaming something like "What is it that you do?" at a thing, right? That was basically us with George Hill.
The part that really kills me: When we got George Hill -- again, for three low draft picks, not a particularly princely sum but hardly a totally negligible one either -- I remember fans outlying two potential scenarios where he would prove indispensible to the Sixers in the playoffs. If either Ben Simmons proved unplayable late in games on offense, or Seth Curry proved unplayable late in games on defense, he would be our safety valve, providing competent two-way play and keeping us from being particularly exposed on either end. Well, both of those scenarios obviously ended up coming very much to fruition -- and it didn't matter, because George Hill was such a relative non-entity on both ends that he wasn't a suitable long-term sub for anyone. We needed a Break Glass in Case of Emergency Option for our Break Glass in Case of Emergency Option.
And now he's gone again -- gone for nothing, gone back to Milwaukee. Not like it's a particularly tragic loss, and I'm not one of the guys who thinks that we were really Just One Lowry Away or whatever, so I'm not even gonna get too hung up on the opportunity cost of the whole thing. George Hill was a reasonable-seeming backup option, I don't really blame Daryl for hedging his bets with him. But with the margins of victory so slim in that Hawks series, and the balance so often swaying on just a couple of plays, the fact that he offered us precisely zero solutions for our very real, obvious and foreseeable problems at any time continues to rankle. The fact that he quietly slinked back to Cream City at the first available opportunity just sorta confirms that he was really a Buck all along. (Also: I hate having to say his full name each time, but I have no choice. He makes sense neither as a George or a Hill, only as a George Hill.)
This is obviously a silly thing to be complaining about this long after the playoffs. It's whatever, if I had something real to write about this week I probably wouldn't be taking the time. And according to David Lipshutz, Father of Friend of the Blog (FOFOTB) Jason Lipshutz, George Hill is still being complained about on Philly Sports Radio more than anyone outside of ~Him~ -- more than Doc Rivers!! -- so maybe y'all don't even need my help with this one. But man, I'd hate to think George Hill's time with the Sixers started, subsided and ended inconspicuously enough that in 10 years, we look at Hill's overall stats for the playoffs and just go "oh yeah, George Hill, didn't work out quite like we hoped but close enough." Nah, not close enough. Not anything enough. George Hill is an Enemy of the Process, and I will be leading the boos (from 90 miles up I-95) when he next shows his face at the Wells Fargo Center.