http://finance.yahoo.com/news/sixers-gm-gave-best-explanation-181000082.html

The Sixers under Hinkie are the most radical experiment in American sports. Since he took over after the 2013 season, he has traded away the team's best players, refused to sign free agents, spent as little money as possible, drafted players who are injured or overseas, and hoarded picks through an unceasing series of trades.

It's blatantly anticompetitive on a night-to-night basis, and a lot of people — NBA fans and otherwise — hate it.

At his press conference, Hinkie explained his thinking.

He said that the only way to win an NBA title is to have a team that can win 55+ games every year. And the only way to have a team that can win 55+ games every year is to get great players. And the only way to get great players is to have enough picks to either 1) draft a great player, or 2) put together a trade package for a great player that can help you make a "big leap."

Here's what he said when asked why he doesn't try to get a little bit better every year:

"What we look at is, how do we add to what we're doing in a way that gets us closer to our goal? We don't think that it will necessarily be linear — that every year you will add five wins and after 10 years you will get to 50. That's not the way we think about the world. We think that it comes at fits and starts, and you have to be prepared to put yourself in a position that you might be able to make big leaps."

Here's how he described the overarching philosophy of how you win in the NBA:

"We're focused on how to put the building blocks in place that have a chance to compete in May. Those teams win in the high-50s. They don't win in the teens and they don't add two or three wins a year and they don't add a win a month for a little while to try and get to where they're going. They get all the way to the 50s. And they get there usually on the backs of great players. We are still — as much as I've talked about how we make decisions and as much as I've talked about our organizational goals and our player development — it is a players-driven league, still. When we have a set of players that can carry us deep, that's the only way, that's the only way to get where we're going."

A central component of the plan is acquiring draft picks. The Sixers could have as many as four top-20 picks in the 2015 draft.

Hinkie said part of the reason he hoards picks is that the draft is fundamentally a crapshoot. You can't draft better than the rest of the NBA, but you can more often than the rest of the NBA:

"We will not bat a thousand on every single draft pick. We also have them by the bushelful, in part, because of that. We don't have any hubris that we will get them all right. We're not certain that we have an enormous edge over anybody else. In some cases, we might not have an edge at all."

Hinkie is only trying to build a championship-level team. He's not interested in building a team that can just make the playoffs, or even win a series or two. He wants a juggernaut, even if it means Philly is the worst team in the NBA for a few years.

When asked when he'll know when the rebuilding process is complete and he has the right players in place, Hinkie responded ominously, "We'll all know. We'll all know."

Here's my question for him. What exactly is his plan for building an actual team? It seems like talent for talent's sake. If I'm looking at Phil, I know that he's looking for specific types of players. Smart, skilled and talented players who are great in a team concept. That's what Phil is actually looking for. You can pretty much tell which players should fit in Phil's system and thus the draft isn't so much of a crapshoot for him. A player that can pass, shows high BB IQ and can score from different areas of the floor are gonna have a high chance of success here. The purely athletic types who don't have high BB IQ or passing ability aren't gong to be as successful. I don't know what Hinkie is actually looking for based on his draft picks so far.

yellowboy90 wrote:Yeah that just sound like a lot of fluff.

Yeah, great players need development too. How are you going to develop anyone when you're constantly cashing guys in for more picks? Teams like the Spurs, the championship Lakers, the Pistons and the Celtics did try to stay competitive during their rebuilds.

BigDaddyG wrote:

yellowboy90 wrote:Yeah that just sound like a lot of fluff.

Yeah, great players need development too. How are you going to develop anyone when you're constantly cashing guys in for more picks? Teams like the Spurs, the championship Lakers, the Pistons and the Celtics did try to stay competitive during their rebuilds.

I don't think they want to develop. I think they want to do what the rockets did. who did they develop?

mreinman wrote:the goal is to stockpile picks for many shots and the draft (which is a crap shoot (even for Phil))

and ...

hope that you can strike it big with a Harden type of trade

and btw, lets not forget that they have cap room to sign anyone

So ... are they not in a billion times better position than we are? As I have said, if Hinke gets hit by a bus tomorrow, he has left his successor in a golden position. If people don't see this then they just don't want to.

Of course he will need to hit big on some moves but he is giving himself 10 foul shots as opposed to 1 half court hook shot.

We fully understand that point of having a ton of draft picks. It's more than that tho. OKC hit big with KD and Westbrook, not to mention other picks. This is what Hinkie has done so far.

Year  Rd  Pk	Player		        G   MP    PTS	TRB   AST   FG%  3P%	FT%	MP	PTS	TRB	AST	WS	WS/48
2014  1   3	Joel Embiid		-													
2014  1   10	Elfrid Payton	        56  1567  443	209   317  .423  .190	.546	28.0	7.9	3.7	5.7	0.7	.021
2014  2   32	K.J. McDaniels	        52  1319  476	195   70   .399  .293	.756	25.4	9.2	3.8	1.3	0.6	.020
2014  2   39	Jerami Grant	        38  710	  218	113   32   .375  .387	.633	18.7	5.7	3.0	0.8	0.7	.050
2014  2   47	Russ Smith	        7   33	  10	3     3    .250  .167	.750	4.7	1.4	0.4	0.4	-0.2	-0.315
2014  2   52	Vasilije Micic		-													
2014  2   54	Nemanja Dangubic	-														
Year  Rd  Pk	Player	                G   MP	  PTS	TRB   AST   FG%  3P%	FT%	MP	PTS	TRB	AST	WS	WS/48
2013  1   11	Michael Carter-Williams	111 3805  1780	691   743  .396  .261	.683	34.3	16.0	6.2	6.7	0.7	.009
2013  2   35	Glen Rice	        16  152   43	24    9    .269  .250	.692	9.5	2.7	1.5	0.6	-0.2	-0.065
2013  2   42	Pierre Jackson		-

He's gonna have a lot of chances to find winning talent. It's going to be interesting to see what he does in terms of actually building a team rather than collecting talent.

crzymdups wrote:It sounds great... unless they get to like year 7 with no superstar in the draft. And what if MCW was that superstar?

He said it himself, the draft is a crapshoot, which we all know, and so is his plan. He is going to just toss around players and picks and throw stuff at the wall hoping something eventually sticks with no end game or timeframe to which he is held accountable. The only thing that is definite in this whole process is his job security, so good for him. Trading MCW shows he is just going to delay the rebuild as far as he can. I was never sold on what he is doing, but i have to say if i were a part of sixers fanbase or ownership, i would be far less confident now. Trading players he drafted for future picks is not a good sign.

Knixkik wrote:

crzymdups wrote:It sounds great... unless they get to like year 7 with no superstar in the draft. And what if MCW was that superstar?

He said it himself, the draft is a crapshoot, which we all know, and so is his plan. He is going to just toss around players and picks and throw stuff at the wall hoping something eventually sticks with no end game or timeframe to which he is held accountable. The only thing that is definite in this whole process is his job security, so good for him. Trading MCW shows he is just going to delay the rebuild as far as he can. I was never sold on what he is doing, but i have to say if i were a part of sixers fanbase or ownership, i would be far less confident now. Trading players he drafted for future picks is not a good sign.

crzymdups wrote:It sounds great... unless they get to like year 7 with no superstar in the draft. And what if MCW was that superstar?

BigDaddyG wrote:

mreinman wrote:

BigDaddyG wrote:

yellowboy90 wrote:Yeah that just sound like a lot of fluff.

Yeah, great players need development too. How are you going to develop anyone when you're constantly cashing guys in for more picks? Teams like the Spurs, the championship Lakers, the Pistons and the Celtics did try to stay competitive during their rebuilds.

I don't think they want to develop. I think they want to do what the rockets did. who did they develop?

Beverly, Parsons, Lowry, Dragic, Donatas Motiejunas, Terrence Jones, Chase Budinger etc. Even before Houston got Howard and Harden, they were looking for talented players who fit their system and you saw improvement from year to year. I don't see that with the 76ers.

none of those guys besides Beverly is here. The guys they have now were attained through asset compilation.

Philly is gonna also have to hit in the draft but they are giving themselves a chance to do so.

StarksEwing1 wrote:

Knixkik wrote:

crzymdups wrote:It sounds great... unless they get to like year 7 with no superstar in the draft. And what if MCW was that superstar?

He said it himself, the draft is a crapshoot, which we all know, and so is his plan. He is going to just toss around players and picks and throw stuff at the wall hoping something eventually sticks with no end game or timeframe to which he is held accountable. The only thing that is definite in this whole process is his job security, so good for him. Trading MCW shows he is just going to delay the rebuild as far as he can. I was never sold on what he is doing, but i have to say if i were a part of sixers fanbase or ownership, i would be far less confident now. Trading players he drafted for future picks is not a good sign.

i would say the sixers are in a better position than we are. We basically have one pick the next 2 years so we better hit a homerun. Cap space doesnt mean we will win in free agency either