October 23, 2024
Brett Davis/Imagn Images
What do the Sixers have in store for Tyrese Maxey's fifth NBA season?
After months of talking about the Sixers, their revamped roster and their chances of finally breaking through in the playoffs, we have finally reached the point where we can stop speculating and just... watch basketball. The Sixers' 82-game regular season schedule begins tonight, and it would not be a true opening night if it did not coincide with a massive collection of predictions for the year ahead.
So, let's get started. Here are 15 of my predictions for the 2024-25 Sixers season:
I took a stab at projecting the Eastern Conference standings this week and ended up landing on the No. 6 seed for the Sixers, which would for the second year in a row prevent them from having home-court advantage for the majority of their first-round playoff series.
This prediction is not an indictment of the roster the Sixers have put together or the amount of talent they have accumulated. It is a reaction to very clear signals that the team will not prioritize winning games in the regular season nearly as much as many of the other teams in an increasingly-competitive Eastern Conference. In addition to the Boston Celtics -- who enter the season as heavy favorites to win the conference once again -- and the New York Knicks, teams like the Milwaukee Bucks, Orlando Magic, Indiana Pacers and Cleveland Cavaliers all loom as quality groups capable of winning plenty of games.
Players must appear in at least 65 games to qualify for All-NBA teams and individual awards. Joel Embiid logging that many games played seems incredibly far-fetched. Paul George has a better chance of hitting the threshold -- the knee injury holding him out of the Sixers' season opener does not appear to be one that will cause a long-term absence -- but I would guess it is rather improbable.
Tyrese Maxey is the Sixers' lone star with a strong chance to qualify for All-NBA teams, and while he undoubtedly has the requisite skill to earn a spot, it will be somewhat of an uphill battle to be named one of the 15 best players in the NBA -- especially because he will often have to cede touches to Embiid and George. If one or both of Maxey's co-stars misses a significant amount of time and he takes over the team, though, he could build a strong case.
The Sixers' public position, in a nutshell: if this prediction comes true, their regular season will have already been largely successful. Time and time again, they have brought hobbled versions of talented teams into April and May, only for it all to fizzle out prematurely. Of course, the team must build good habits during the regular season so that they can properly flip the switch once the playoffs begin. But the regular season will be judged much more by process than results for this team as it looks to merely ensure a healthy team exists at its conclusion.
Martin was signed to a contract uniquely designed to make him a likely trade candidate midseason, and that deal made him an afterthought as far as short-term contributions go in the minds of some. Martin had as strong of a training camp and preseason as anybody, has been outspoken about the much-improved sense of comfort he feels as he enters his first full season with the Sixers and has received strong reviews from Sixers head coach Nick Nurse and several teammates.
Three-point shooting has always been a weakness for Martin, who said he spent much of the summer working with a shooting coach. Martin's mechanics have never been unpleasant to look at, but they do seem cleaner now, with refined hand placement being the critical change. He is an outstanding athlete -- likely the best on the team -- who could be a massive beneficiary of Nurse's additional emphasis on increased pace this season. He has also turned into a skilled passer in short-roll situations, where he has gained a lot of trust from coaches and teammates.
Unfortunately for Martin, dissuading the team from trading him is much more difficult than just outperforming other players on the depth chart or becoming a quality contributor. He must also outperform the upper echelon of players the Sixers could acquire via trade, because moving Martin is the team's only realistic path to adding talent in the $8 million-$12 million salary range without moving the more established and crucial Kelly Oubre Jr. or a combination of Andre Drummond and rookie Jared McCain. It is going to be an uphill battle for Martin to earn a stay in Philadelphia beyond next February, but he has the talent and athleticism to make it happen.
Can preseason momentum turn into regular season production? I am buying stock.
MORE: Sixers player preview: KJ Martin
This prediction is not nearly as bold as it sounds when you recall how low the bar is. Paul Reed's 2023-24 campaign very well may be the most productive of any full-time backup center the Sixers have ever had behind Embiid, and it was not a season to write home about.
Drummond is certainly not a perfect player -- he can be exposed by stretch fives and is prone to the occasional poor decision on offense, for example -- but is a low-end starting-caliber center, and that makes him enormously valuable for a Sixers team that will often need him to step into the starting five.
Embiid not scrimmaging for the entirety of training camp or playing in the preseason could present issues when he is back on the floor, but on the bright side, it has enabled Drummond to spend all of that time becoming acquainted with the remaining starters, which should help when he is asked to man the middle for the majority of games.
Drummond has a player option worth $5 million for the 2025-26 season; Oubre has one worth just under $8.4 million. I believe both will have strong enough seasons that they will be able to easily decline those options and re-enter free agency. Both players appear to be interested in remaining in Philadelphia long-term, though a lot can happen between now and June 30, 2025. Oubre claimed he passed up more lucrative offers this past summer in order to return to the Sixers on a two-year deal containing a player option that allows him to re-up for more money next offseason should things go as planned.
By the time the playoffs begin, Lowry will be 39 years old and Gordon will be 36 years old. Relying on veterans with as much mileage as those two have can be extremely dangerous, but I believe both players have what it takes to hold off Father Time for at least another season -- in part because the Sixers will likely monitor each one's workload.
Gordon is very smart, tough as nails and a much better defensive player than many give him credit for. But the reason he has the ability to remain a rotation-caliber player at this point of his career is that he is one of the most accomplished three-point shooters in NBA history. Gordon very quickly worked his way into consideration for Nurse's starting five, and it appears he will be the Sixers' starting shooting guard to open the season.
Lowry, meanwhile, has enough brain power alone to be a quality third guard. The hometown player is an absolute basketball savant, and his tremendous upper body strength helps him defend wings with regularity. Even with diminished explosion, Lowry gives the Sixers reliable spot-up shooting, excellent passing, physical defense against multiple positions, organizational skills and -- again -- an ingenious nature that has powered his successful career.
MORE: 'He's a winner': Sixers grateful to have Lowry back
As of this writing, McCain is not on the injury report for the season opener, which will take place a week after the rookie had a scary fall that caused a pulmonary contusion. With George sidelined and Gordon expected to start, there is a strong chance McCain will be in the rotation for his first NBA contest.
McCain's three-point shooting alone is enough that, in many matchups, he can be a viable bench piece. At the moment, he projects as the first perimeter player out of the rotation when the team is fully healthy. Accordingly, I expect that he will have more than enough opportunities to get on the floor throughout the season, but will not necessarily be an 82-game player.
For a rookie on a hopeful championship contender drafted in the middle of the first round, that is not just an acceptable outcome -- it would be an overwhelmingly positive one.
Nurse raves about Dowtin at every possible opportunity, and for good reason: Dowtin, who returned to the Sixers on a two-way contract, is a coach's dream: a point guard who makes sound decisions with the ball, can create a quick shot at the end of a shot clock and has the length to be a pest against ball-handlers while also being effective against pick-and-rolls.
MORE: Dowtin ready for 2024-25: 'He just does a lot of things really solid'
I have believed Dowtin is an NBA-caliber player for several months, and it would not be surprising if the Sixers feel the same way. Dowtin's two-way contract affords him the chance to be active for 50 NBA games. He would not be eligible to participate in the playoffs if he does not get converted to a standard deal before the end of the regular season.
"Being on a two-way contract, the ultimate goal is to work your way up and get to a standard contract," Dowtin said to PhillyVoice in The Bahamas earlier this month. "So that's kind of been my main goal."
Plenty of fans entered the season with lots of excitement about Council, who shined as an undrafted rookie on a two-way contract last season. Council earned a conversion to a standard deal before the end of last season and entered 2024-25 hoping to become a rotation regular. Council had his moments in the preseason, but did not see much action at all with the Sixers' core pieces.
Signed later in the offseason after a standout performance in the Olympic Games for Team France, Yabusele had a strong preseason and will likely be on the floor in the season opener. Yabusele's transformation into a quality player overseas in the aftermath of an unsuccessful two-year stint with the Boston Celtics was powered by significant improvement from beyond the arc, and that improved tool was on full display during the preseason. Yabusele appears firmly ahead of Council within the pecking order...
...And part of the reason is that Yabusele has emerged as not just an option at power forward, where he is at his natural position, but as the Sixers' third-string center. With Embiid sidelined to open the season, Yabusele is slated to back up Drummond at the five. And given the aforementioned expectation that Embiid will sit out plenty of games, it stands to reason that Yabusele will log quite a few minutes as a small-ball center.
Someone who I do not expect to factor into the team's center rotation this season is second-round pick Adem Bona, whose rookie season should be spent getting development in the G League. Bona profiles as an exciting backup center option in the future, with the tools and motor to impact winning for any team.
It is going to take time, though. Bona needs to find greater offensive utility beyond screening, and perhaps most importantly, he needs to learn how to be more disciplined as a defender to reduce his gargantuan foul rates.
MORE: Drummond hopes to mentor Bona
From the looks and sounds of it, Jackson will be a terrific locker room presence for the Sixers. He is a well-respected veteran who has been there and done that, serving in every role imaginable for a host of teams. He has won a championship and is extremely close with both George and Drummond.
With Maxey and Lowry already in place, Jackson will likely serve as more of a change-of-pace player than anything else. Whether Jackson has enough all-around ability to consistently impact winning is unclear, but that will not be what the Sixers ask him to do. What he is able to do is, every once in a while, get unreasonably hot as a bucket-getter and score in bunches. It is inevitable that there will be a Reggie Jackson Game at some point in 2024-25.
Caleb Martin was expected all summer long to be a starter for the Sixers after joining the team via a four-year contract. But he appears to now be the odd man out in favor of Gordon and his three-point shooting. However, this should not cloud anybody's perception of Caleb Martin's value to the Sixers. Coming off the bench is something the battle-tested wing is comfortable doing, and the arrangement will likely not actually impact his minutes per game much (if at all). In addition to adding Gordon's shooting gravity to the starting lineup, Nurse said he wanted Caleb Martin to bring a necessary infusion of energy into second unit lineups.
Ultimately, what matters far more than which players start a game is which ones close it. Martin's defensive versatility and simplified offensive role make him tailor-made to finish games for the same reason he was viewed as a viable option to start alongside Maxey, George, Embiid and Oubre.
MORE: Sixers film study: Caleb Martin
The Sixers went 47-35 in 2023-24, and I have them finishing with the exact same record in 2024-25. Really creative, right?
In all seriousness, anywhere between 45 and 50 wins or so seemed like a reasonable estimate to me, depending on one's opinion on how many games Embiid would appear in. I split the difference here.
This record may underwhelm many -- it is well below their over/under, which was recently set at 50.5 -- but, again, how much does it matter? Winning closer to 55 games and earning a more favorable playoff seed would be wonderful, but it would not be worth putting Embiid's short- and long-term health in any more risk than it needs to be.
The Sixers appear to have embraced the idea that they just need to get into the playoffs healthy -- at any spot in the standings -- to give themselves the best possible chance to finally make a deeper playoff run and perhaps compete for a championship.
And with that, I am out of predictions. The time to watch meaningful basketball has arrived. Pencils down, everybody!
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