5 Numbers that Explain the Sixers’ Season So Far
Turning to math like Sam Hinkie would have wanted.
The first third of the Sixers season has gone about as poorly as anyone ever could have predicted. They have twice as many losses as wins, Joel Embiid suffered a right sinus fracture midway through last week’s game against the Pacers, and seemingly out of nowhere, Jared McCain was revealed to have suffered a torn meniscus following the loss. At this point, it wouldn’t be too shocking if we woke up one day and saw half the team diagnosed with leprosy.
But rather than focus on the big-picture narratives that have harmed this Sixers’ season, let’s focus a little more specifically on the cold hard numbers that capture the finer points of the story. Here are five numbers that explain the Sixers’ largely disappointing first 24 games, for better but mostly for worse:
92 — Possessions the Sixers’ Most-Played Lineup has Spent on the Court Together
That’s courtesy of Cleaning the Glass, which notably sorts out any and all garbage time possessions. Through 24 games, the lineup the Sixers have put out on the court most often this season is the quintet of Tyrese Maxey, Kyle Lowry, Caleb Martin, Kelly Oubre, and Andre Drummond, and they’ve only spent 92 possessions on the court together. Not exactly what we all had in mind after this summer.
Perhaps the more concerning fact is this: All 29 other teams in the NBA have had at least one lineup play 100 non-garbage time possessions together this season. Even the beyond injured corpse of the 2024-25 Pelicans have found a five-man group that’s spent 118 possessions on the floor this season. It’s truly baffling just how little consistency the Sixers have been able to find this season.
Injuries are obviously the main culprit here, as Kelly Oubre and Guerschon Yabusele are the only two players on the roster who have played in each of the 24 games this season. Every time a key cog in the rotation returns from an ailment, another player goes down injured, almost as if the Sixers have a weekly quota of unfortunate events they have to hit each week. Likewise, the rotating cast of characters along with inconsistent shooting and play has understandably led Nick Nurse toward trying just about any and every lineup combination this season.
The Maxey-Lowry-Martin-Oubre-Drummond group also hasn’t been very good, to be clear. Per CTG, they’re getting outscored by more than 19 points per 100 possessions. In fact, all four of the Sixers’ most frequently played lineups this season have been outscored by quite a bit in their possessions on the floor together.
Seems less than ideal.
10 — Games in a Row Kelly Oubre Jr. has Scored in the Double-Digits (Active Streak)
It’s nothing to write home about, and it doesn’t make up for every other thing that’s gone horribly wrong this season. However, it is nice that amidst the ongoing turmoil of the season that the Tsunami Papi has found a bit of rhythm over the last few weeks.
Following a rough start where he was taking far too many contested jumpers, Oubre has eased back into his proper role with the return of Paul George, and once again looks like the same helpful role player he was a season ago for Philadelphia. His drives in particular have been far more decisive and effective. No more meandering dribbles that create no meaningful advantage. Rather, Oubre rips hard, gets downhill, and uses his great athletic traits to punish his defenders at the rim.
Additionally, Oubre’s passing has also been much improved in recent games. He’s found some success as a short roll distributor, picking apart the defense while he’s already crashing toward the paint with an advantage.
Mix this all in with the important role he serves as the Sixers’ most ferocious and opportunistic perimeter defender, and it’s turned into a fine second season for Oubre in Philadelphia. Before Monday night’s 19-point outburst in Charlotte, he had scored between exactly 11 and 15 points in the previous nine games, which is exactly what the Sixers need from him.
It’s not what anyone would have predicted back when he first signed with the Sixers in 2023, but amidst all the constant changes the team has endured, Oubre has become one of the more reliable players on the team.
21.6 — The Sixers’ Assist-Per-Game Average
As you might have guessed, that ranks dead last in the entire NBA.
I already wrote about the Sixers’ passing issues over a month ago, but it really does stand out every time they take the court. There’s just very little flow to the offense, very little blend where the ball ends up firing around the court and ending up in the hands of a wide open teammate.
Of course, assists are dependent on the guy who the ball was passed to making the shot, which has also been one of the Sixers’ major weaknesses this season. It’s a circular issue where each of the team’s shortcomings on offense contribute to them being the lowest-assist team in the league. The Sixers don’t throw great passes, so they don’t get a ton of great open shots, but when they do get open shots, they’ve been missing them way too much, and when they miss open shots, it makes the people who passed out to the open shooters want to not throw it back out to them again, and so on.
The Sixers aren’t very good at passing or shooting through 24 games, and the sum total of those problems is a team that just barely cracks 20 assists per game while the rest of the NBA can regularly generate 25-30 assists on a given night.
15 — Total Players Drafted Before Jared McCain
This isn’t to say Sixers fans should be grateful despite all the losses, or that things aren’t actually all that bad. It is that bad. At their current pace, the Sixers would finish the season with a 27-55 record, in a year where the goal was true title contention.
Yet, it’s important to remember just how special Jared McCain was prior to the meniscus injury, and how much his ascendance means to the Sixers moving forward. With the 16th pick in a draft class that was thought of as underwhelming, Daryl Morey and Co. drafted the guy who was running away with Rookie of the Year, and seems pretty set as one of the key faces of the franchise moving forward.
That’s special. Rookies are almost always bad, and even when they look good, the underlying metrics usually point to their on-court production being empty calories that don’t contribute to good, winning basketball. That wasn’t the case for McCain (on offense, at least).
He’s quite literally the only rookie in the NBA this season with a positive Offensive Estimated Plus-Minus (O-EPM). He has the best Offensive Box Plus-Minus (BPM) on the entire Sixers team at 2.0, which is almost unheard of for a first-year player. It can’t be said enough; he got to the NBA and was already well above average in offensive skills and refinement.
It sucks that he’s sidelined for the foreseeable future with the meniscus injury, but don’t let that make you forget how special he was for these past two months.
1 — Games the Sixers Have Left on the Schedule Against the Charlotte Hornets
The Charlotte Hornets infinite-win glitch the Sixers have stumbled upon will be coming to an end this Friday at Wells Fargo Center, one way or another.
The Sixers are 3-0 against the Hornets despite being 5-16 against the rest of the NBA. In fact, the only win they have over an opponent with a winning record was the home victory over Orlando. It’s great that the Sixers can take care of business against one of the league’s preeminent tankers in Charlotte and maintain a certain level of respectability in their record, but that won’t be an option moving forward. The next month of basketball for them includes games against the Cavs, Celtics, Thunder, Warriors, Suns, and Knicks.
All to this say, they better be 4-0 against Charlotte after Friday, because the season only gets harder after that.
Daniel Olinger is a writer for the Rights To Ricky Sanchez, and author of “The Danny” column, even though he refuses to be called that in person. He can be followed on X @dan_olinger.
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