Sixers (12-6) remain atop the Eastern Conference, but fall to 0-4 on the season without Joel Embiid in the lineup.
Four games is apparently too early to be worried about a trend for someone who has coached in 22 NBA seasons and played in 15.
The Sixers are 0-4 without Joel Embiid after their All-Star center was sidelined by back tightness Monday night and the team fell to the Pistons, 119-104. Head coach Doc Rivers isn’t sounding any alarms.
“I’m not that concerned with it,” he said. “A lot of these games we’ve had multiple guys out. Tonight it was just Joel — and Mike Scott. I think not having an extra four does make a difference. But we didn’t play well tonight. This was a very winnable game, in my opinion. We just didn’t win the game.
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"Again, I’m not going to overdo it right now. Way too early. I’ll let you guys push the buttons. I’m not. I like our team, I like how we’re playing overall. It’s one loss; I’m not going to go and put my head in the sand or anything like that.”
The team’s losses without Embiid include a 24-point defeat to the 8-9 Cavaliers, a 22-turnover effort against the Grizzlies and a wire-to-wire defeat to the Pistons, who are now 4-13 on the season.
Though Rivers won’t fret over an individual regular-season game, he does wish he’d tweaked the Sixers’ Plan B. He started Tony Bradley instead of Dwight Howard to begin the second half and thought he should’ve played the 23-year-old with the first unit from the start of the game.
“I just like Dwight with the second group,” Rivers said. “I was kicking myself because I wanted to do that and then, because Tony hasn’t played a lot, I didn’t do it to start the game, and I really thought we should’ve done it to start the game. I’ll fault myself on that.”
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Bradley, who’d only played in five games as a Sixer before Monday, recorded 12 points and nine rebounds in 23 minutes. While not as agile or explosive as Howard, Bradley has been a high-level rebounder in the G League and during his time with the Jazz. He looked more sure of himself and how to play within the Sixers’ system than he had in previous appearances.
Predictably, lineups with Howard and Ben Simmons on the floor have performed several rungs worse than last season’s Simmons-Al Horford lineups. (Against Detroit, it also didn't help that Simmons was hampered by foul trouble and only played 21 minutes.)
According to Cleaning the Glass, Simmons-Howard lineups sport a minus-12.9 net rating in 264 possessions outside of garbage time. They’re performing well in a few categories, among them offensive rebounding percentage, free throw rate and opponents’ field goal percentage at the rim, but Horford usually helped the Sixers be more well-rounded when he shared the court with Simmons.
The team has also played in transition much less effectively thus far with Simmons and Howard, scoring exactly 100 points per 100 transition plays, per Cleaning the Glass, which is in the fourth percentile for the NBA. Nights like the sloppy, disjointed defeat in Cleveland surely have a lot to do with that. Horford, in contrast to Howard, typically made the kind of smart, sensible passes conducive to efficiency in transition.
Though starting Bradley can’t be expected to solve everything the next time the Sixers are missing Embiid, it seems to be a tactic worth trying, especially given Rivers’ desire to build a distinct identity for his second unit.
“Whatever the situation may be, I’m just going to make sure I’m ready, starting or not. … If not, just keep working hard — in the weight room, conditioning and all that. It’s all good,” Bradley said.
If Horford's only role last season was to back up Embiid, he would’ve been pretty good at it. For as badly as the Sixers struggled offensively when Embiid, Simmons and Horford played together, the backup five spot itself wasn’t a problem, at least during the regular season. Of course, that alone wasn’t nearly sufficient to justify the team’s decision to give Horford a four-year contract with $97 million guaranteed.
President of basketball operations Daryl Morey moved on from Horford, invested much less in the backup center position and focused on surrounding Embiid and Simmons with players who could enhance their talents. So far, so good on that final priority, which is logically the most important one. The Sixers are 9-0 when their opening-night starting lineup plays.
As for the Embiid backup plan, it doesn’t yet register on Rivers’ radar of concerns with his team, which sits at 12-6 and first in the Eastern Conference heading into a game Wednesday against the defending champion Lakers.
“Not much (concern), honestly. It’s (18) games or whatever into the season,” he said. “I don’t have a lot of panic or concerns at this point in the season with all the guys that have been in and out. I really don’t worry about it that much. Obviously, you have to win games without Joel, but you’ve got to get your team in order first. I think the second half of the season, if that happens, we’ll see more, but right now it is not on my list of concerns, I’ll put it that way.”