Sixers lose fourth right in crunch-time debacle vs. Raptors

Joel Embiid turned the ball over on the game’s most important possession vs. Toronto and gave Raptors a 106-103 victory to add another disgusting loss to Sixers’ season. Tyrese Maxey scored only five points in a nightmare match for their leading guard.

Here’s what I saw.

The good

– In a transparent attempt to get younger at the deadline, Daryl Morey Seek Jared Butler and Quentin Grimes to bring some juice to a team with a few older stars. It is far too early to judge how much influence they will have on this team, but I am already happy to see guys along with Embiid not moving at a glacial pace. These two took the floor in a backup lineup with EMBIID to open the second quarter, and you can see the contour of a group that can play effective two-way basketball.

Butler was trigger -happy, but more than effective as their leading guard during these minutes, using a bit of hesitation to blow past Gradey Dick for a particularly memorable bucket in the second quarter. When Sixers was able to stop with that lineup on the floor, Butler did a good job of navigating the early violations, which made the hit-free passes when needed and pushed more often the pace itself. It was a welcome sight for a backup point next to Embiid, especially after watching Kyle Lowry and Reggie Jackson this season.

You could come up with a true argument that Butler was their second best player on Tuesday. Of course, it’s cursed with weak praise, but he was their most reliable opportunity to go and get a bucket out of the group of players who were not named Embiid. If you want to put a little guard on the floor, let it be someone who has the legs to get past a defender several times a game. Sign up for him as a backup point for now, and the fourth guard in the future with Maxey, McCain and Grimes.

I have greater hopes for Grimes, which I think should see a look at starting before rather than later. He is firmly one of the best, if not the best athlete on the team already, something he highlighted with a blow for a thump in the second quarter. The downside is that Grimes Bit a little more than he could chew after getting the chance to start in the second half, take some poorly advised jumpers and run the violation a little too much, but the flashes were there.

In Lineups, where Embiid is the undisputed king of the court, you need guys with final niches, and I think they have it with a lot of their current young players. Butler is the ball trader, Grimes is a shooting game and defender, Yabusele is a great body with the ability to play Hi-Lo with Embiid and then sprinkle someone from the mixture of Oubre/Council IV/Edwards depending on your needs.

The bad

– A game against this year’s Toronto Raptors must be easy money for Embiid. They have some interesting big ones on their list to develop for the future, but for the most part they have guys who are too small and unable to bother Embiid at the defensive end.

Tuesday’s first half was a good example of Embiid, just punishing big ones who have to try to compensate for the size/strength of the — outlines by playing aggressive defense. Raptors still tried to stick the ball away and loosen Embiid when he was in the middle of his settlement for shots, and more often they did not get up empty, pushed in the air or got in touch with an embeess forearm on his way to free throw for the big man.

I thought he was doing a nice job of attacking Toronto on the go and forced them into tough decisions as they treated him methodically towards the edge. An excessive Embiid may be a threat to barrel through defenders, but he showed a solid level of restraint that hit some drop-off passports and kickouts as Raptors defenders tried to slip into his path to charges that never came. He had three assists at the break and I thought he probably deserved more based on the quality and time of his passing.

Something I loved to see in the second half? EMBIID affects the game as a rebounder. Although his vertical jumping ability was not what it used to be, Embiid spent a lot of the third quarter settling into position near the curve as guards and shooters set up jumpers. He went from having two rebounds at the break to hitting double digits before the third was up, and flipping teammates for extra options. And that was it Comfortable The best he has moved to defense in a while, not that there have been many games to measure this against. Embiid was the only thing that stopped Toronto from a parade to the edge, and looking close to there were at least a few business decisions instead of challenging him.

And then, in the most important moment of the game, Embiid just melted down completely. MAXEY GIFT PACKED HAM A Wide Open Path Three on a Pick-and-Pop with under 15 seconds to play, and rather than just entering the open shot, embiid drove in traffic and made a turnover from what should have been an impossible situation. Deleted all the good for a period of about five seconds. The season from hell doesn’t let up.

– Tyrese Maxey scored zero points in the first half, which I wasn’t even aware of was possible for him at this time. But it felt like an accurate reflection of his influence on the game and the team on Tuesday. No way about it, it was a stink.

Early on, I think you could have settled on the belief that he was feeling his way into the game and trying to get the other guys started with the available full strength. Raptors also did a good job of getting him to work at the place of attack, so he breached to move the ball away from pressure and tried to let the offense run his way.

However, this apology falls away when you are deep into the second half with a goose egg on the board. There were opportunities for Maxey to attack, and he fell by a strangely passive state for some reason. Toronto threw a couple of zone looking at Sixers and was not very crispy with their execution, and it was a bit shocking to see Maxey staring down a semi-open look from three, as if it was impossible that he would even think of taking the shot. It’s not like he’s in a bad form of shape that he had come in a little scary – Maxey has been on a violent for a month in a row.

His colleagues, who were not an EMBIID star, were almost like anonymous, though I suspect we have come to expect it. It was another Paul George game where you looked up the third quarter buzzing and wondering what he did exactly for most of the night. He just flows through play night after night and fails to impose his will on both ends of the floor.

Where I give Both of These guys a break is that it seems that Nick Nurse hasn’t figured out a good plan to maximize the talents from off-ball shooters. They occasionally run flare screen and lean on dribbling handling to get guys clean looks coming around an Embiid choice, but otherwise there are not many designed plays that are driven to take advantage of their catch-and-shoot skill . You get the usual kick-outs and swing passes, but it’s pretty shocking that a team that is constantly running more miniature ball dealers together does not have a deeper bag of acting for off-ball weapons.

That said, you have to help yourself and I didn’t think this was a game that was particularly embossed. He was not an end to most of this game, making pretty quick decisions, whether he shoots or got rid of the ball. Just a bad game for Maxey and George, I think.

– Although he has been one of the positive standouts this season for his efforts and general accessibility, it has been a fight for Kelly Oubre in recent weeks. I would not come close to accusing him of all their defensive decision -making problems, but he has been a poster child for their inefficiency for that purpose. He cheats a little too hard, a little too often, constantly surrendering appearance that is more open than they have any right to be.

– Regular readers know how I feel about Guerschon Yabusele, but this was a clunker for him. Toronto spent many of his minutes watching him trying to punish them on offense, and Yabusele was ineffective, lack of triangles and layups. In fact, he was worse near the edge than he was like a three-point shooter, where he was missing all three of his two-point attempts.

You could also see some of his limitations as a defensive four against Toronto’s best athletes. Scottie Barnes drove past him so quickly for a while or two that he might as well have stood still. Hard night.

The ugly

– If you lose several times to this raptor team in a single season, just pack it all up.

Knowing how much of a mess this team is not sure why Nick Nurs chose to let them play it out instead of calling timeout with 20 seconds left, but I get to ask him quickly enough.

– One of the reasons I think it is important to distinguish between “soft” and “damage that is prone to is that the former is a mental problem and the latter is a physical problem that is often not in your Control. Exposed to injury, I would never call him soft.

We saw the first -hand Tuesday night when Embiid was tied under Toronto’s basket that fought for a ball near the edge. Wrestling to the floor to try to hold the ball, Embiid ended up being slammed into the hardwood with his left arm, there absorbs the strength of the strength. He had visible pain on the floor, and after he showed up, to the point that he refused to use the left arm on the jump ball, which led to something scraped with official Ed Malloy.

But of course he continued to play as he has played through a lot of other dents, bruises, falls, tears and other problems along the way. It doesn’t make him constantly hurt less frustrating, it’s just something to consider before he acts like the guy has no desire to be out there or is not willing to play through pain.