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Justlaxin's avatar

I know this is sadly moot now, and has nothing to do with rebounding, but I noticed a weird Sixers stat recently. Lineups with Maxey and McCain this year are very good on defense (83rd percentile per CtG which, I believe excludes garbage time). And, last year, they were above average (63rd percentile).

The next thing anyone seeing that will say is “Sample size!” And I would have thought the same thing. But combined it’s like 1200 possessions (our roughly 12 full NBA games worth). Sure, that isn’t huge but considering it doesn’t have garbage time that’s 1/6th of an entire season of possessions…not nothing.

Beckett Sanderson's avatar

Would be very interested to look into who they played with in those minutes together, as that might have something to do with it. But yeah, Maxey and McCain are not actively horrible defenders by any means. I think they could have found a way to work together long term in the VanVleet and Lowry mold (which is part of why Nurse clearly not liking McCain was also so confusing to me).

Justlaxin's avatar

Yeah, that would be more research effort than I am willing to do lol.

And a fair-ish rebuttal would be “what about in the playoffs!?”

And maybe that’s true. But I have been mulling two thoughts on that general topic:

1. It seems that, while there are generally trends of things that do and don’t work (playing a whole team or 6’2 guards, no matter how good, seems foolhardy, for example), plenty of good teams steer the direction of things with new styles and advantage creation.

The Thunder play like a million guards and a 6’6 guy at PF a ton. The Pacers similarly created a good enough defense with plenty of individually below average defenders and no abundance of size.

There are limits. But good teams and good talent can push the paradigm more than it ever seems the Sixers and Daryl try to.

2. It seems like, in the post-process era, the Sixers can never get away with things other teams seem to manage just fine.

Throw Seth Curry or JJ Redick out there? Get bullied into oblivion by everyone. But the Hawks can play Trae and Heurter and Lou Wil just fine!

People worry about Maxey still in the playoffs and I’ve seen him get picked on despite his massive improvements on defense. But Jalen Brunson exists. Haliburton exists. Tyler Herro was in a finals team! What gives? lol.

Beckett Sanderson's avatar

I'm definitely not the person to argue with that one. One of my most ardent takes (before a recent move has rendered it now impossible) was that the Sixers should absolutely keep Maxey, VJ, McCain, and Grimes all together. You can never have too much ball handling and shooting, and they are all capable enough defenders (especially VJ and Grimes, with Maxey also coming on recently). The way teams have had success recently is by constantly throwing out speed, ball handling, and shooting, and creating advantages based on that play. The ability of all four guards to play both on and off-ball would have made that extremely enticing for the Sixers in my humble opinion.

Justlaxin's avatar

Oh yeah, wasn’t saying this as a point of argument or disagreement at all! I was just zooming in on my strong perception that, for some reason, other teams can get away lineups the Sixers can’t seem to. And this is across recent Sixers coaches too, so it’s not like it s Nurse problem. Pre-broken Simmons was a very good player but a non shooter. And good teams killed us for playing him in the playoffs. Other teams playoff teams play lineups with a non-shooter all the time! As I mentioned, same for a small guard or a small guard plus a bad defending player who happens to be slightly taller. And that makes me insane. Because it makes me think it is the Sixers are “correct” that Maxey + McCain couldn’t work but that, for some reason, that is only true for the Sixers.

The AI Architect's avatar

Love the deep dive here! The disconnect betwen what's working individually and the overall results is suprisingly common in basketball. I've seen this exact pattern with a few teams where guard aggression in transition becomes a hidden tax on the defensive glass. The Drummond/Bona minutes thing is tricky tho because development value vs immediate rebounding help.