Sixers 2025-26 Will our luck ever change? [LeBron to Sixers!]

[VoteForKalas]

Neither Embiid nor LeBron will likely play back to back games and both will be injured or under load management or both during the season.

They need plans for all of those scenarios and Nurse better adhere to those plans. If the depth is good, then he better use and find roles for all of them.

[phillychuck]

Nurse is a 'burn the guys out during the season' type of coach. I don’t have any confidence he’ll reduce Tyrese’s minutes, and overuse of Tyrese and Brown is the likeliest pitfall going forward this season. either of those players getting injured and out for a playoff series or more is a big blow.

[bigegypt0417]

I think maxey will get less playing time just based on how many guards they brought in.

Brown,Edgecombe and Maxey along with KCP, Simon's and Philon will need playing time.

[phillychuck]

Sixers waived Terry and signed LeBron officially.

[VoteForKalas]

Nurse is a 'burn the guys out during the season' type of coach.

I agree and am concerned as well. Hopefully, the FO and players will both hammer it into his head that they need to use the roster depth and rest the starters more consistently.

[bigegypt0417]

I think it's hard to judge because the sixers didn't have the depth to do anything but play the stars big minutes.

They have 6 guards that will need playing time.

[phillychuck]

I think it's hard to judge because the sixers didn't have the depth to do anything but play the stars big minutes.

I’m sorry, I don’t understand this response at all...they have excellent depth at 1-4. Not much behind Embiid, but Bona and Hukporti are at least functional. There is NO reason to burn the stars in the regular season. None. Any time Nurse plays any of the major starters more than 35 minutes he should be reprimanded. Fired if he can’t fix it.

[bigegypt0417]

I'm saying going in to this season.

To say Nurse burns players forgets that our Guard depth last year was not great...there was a huge falloff with reserves which I don't believe exists after the offseason moves. Nurse should have a really good rotation of guards this season.

[phillychuck]

Guard depth was pretty good early...they had McCain and Grimes, and Edwards for depth. Payne was available late in the season.

[bigegypt0417]

Yeah,,,true.

I'm not sold on Nurse but I can't imagine he'll have long to make this work.

[zambonir]

I'm not sold on Nurse but I can't imagine he'll have long to make this work.

Who's the coach LeBron brings in if that happens?

[phillychuck]

Who's the coach LeBron brings in if that happens?

I have no idea how much influence LeBron will have. Myers has lots of contacts he might prefer. Nurse is represented by Klutch so he’s got a bit of insulation.

[zambonir]

I was mostly kidding. No good can come from an in-season coaching change. And Mike Brown is not available.

I do think Nurse went with what the FO gave him and/or wanted. Particularly with regards to McCain.

[phillychuck]

Nurse wore Maxey into the ground. He was running on fumes in the playoffs. he had a perfectly good 3-guard rotation with Grimes. Maxey 35 mins/ VJ 35 ins/Grimes 26 mins as a base, but Edwards/McCain/Payne were all playable, too. No excuse, and people asked him about the load repeatedly. he always said it would go down, but it never did, and should never have been that high. NBA coaches can’t go balls to the wall to win every regular season game.

[phillychuck]

Just for giggles, here are the usage numbers for the starting 5 last season:

Player Last year
Maxey 29.4
Edgecombe 20.1
Brown 36.2
LeBron 27.2
Embiid 33.5
Total 146.4

That looks like if they share the pain equally, it’s about a 1/3 reduction for everyone in usage...That’s not perfect because their usages will go up when others are not on the floor, but it’s actually probably pretty close. I would not want to be Nick Nurse. Or I would but I’d hire the smartest scheme/usage guy in the NBA that I could find.

[phillychuck]

I play 82-0 occasionally and I’ll never have a better team than this: In the way they score things, Jordan is the third best player on this team! Doncic>Malone>Jordan>Bird>Free

[bigegypt0417]

Ouch....
https://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/nba/2026/09/02/clippers-penalties-five-draft-picks-kawhi-leonard-and-steve-ballmer-fined/86168259007/

[Pat_Burrell]

I was sure the clippers pulled some nonsense with the deal with the Jumbotron company. Then we heard about possibly 1-2 other sham endorsements, then it’s leaked that no direct evidence tying Balmer to these potential sham side deals, then the nba drops the hammer. The reporting on this sat dormant for over a year then moved in 20 directions in the last 2 weeks

[VoteForKalas]

Except they only dropped the hammer on one of the perpetrators.

Leonard gets away with a wrist slap and the companies providing the fraudulent endorsements got no punishment at all.

[zambonir]

Well the NBA doesn't have any jurisdiction over the companies. They could ban them from any future deals with teams but I assume that's already a given. Anything else would be on the legal system.

As for Leonard, he's allowed to take as much money as he can make as outside income. He wasn't breaking any league rules, the team was. Even if he was not innocent of what was it really meant.

So, he's paying the league back $700,000. Is that allegedly the amount of money that actually violated the cap or is it that number for some other reason? And why is it paying the league "back."?

A good punishment for Kawhi would be to make him stay with the Clippers, however.