The Sixers tried their best but could not outlast the Utah Jazz in a battle for tank positioning, winning Sunday’s game 126-122 behind 25 points each for Lonnie Walker and Quentin Grimes.

Here’s what I saw.

The Good

— Quentin Grimes has not been gunshy while playing lead guard for Philadelphia, but despite his push for a big-money contract in the summer, he is playing pretty firmly within the framework of the offense. It’s a good blend of hunting his shot and setting the table for others, which bodes well for his future on a healthier version of this team.

Frankly, Grimes probably could have gone out and taken 30 shots if he wanted to, with Utah playing poor point of attack defense and with very little help at the rim because of Walker Kessler’s absence. Instead, he continued to pick his spots effectively, scoring almost at will while finding teammates for open threes whenever Utah decided to load up against him on the interior. He will fit with Maxey and McCain alike, whether serving as the outlet or allowing them to move and manipulate away from the ball.

And hey, as a bonus, he was one of the few guys in the starting lineup who showed any desire to play defense!

— The Sixers got two very good performances from Jared Butler and Lonnie Walker IV on Sunday night, which is amusing in a messed-up way when you consider how many games they might have swung in their favor this season with even semi-comptetence from a backup guard. In any case, both guys took advantage of porous defense from Utah, driving to the basket whenever they felt like it for most of the final 2.5 quarters.

Walker seems to have come alive after an ultra-disappointing start to his Sixers tenure, and who can blame him for the slow readjustment to NBA speed and a smaller NBA role? With some room to experiment and play through mistakes, Walker has found his footing and shown the flashes of a fun scoring guard off of the bench. He took Drummond’s place in the starting lineup to open the second half, and with Yabusele at center and acres of space to play in, he was a thorn in Utah’s side for most of the second half.

One piece of encouraging and surprising news — Butler played some pretty damn good on-ball defense in this one, either directly causing a turnover or playing enough pressure to lead to a turnover on several first-half possessions. He has some serious limitations on that end as a result of his size, but the desire to compete is there, and that’ll give him a shot to hang.

— This is the sort of team Adem Bona is built to play against. Utah doesn’t have sharp enough passers to cut you up with the slash-and-kick game, and their downhill players lack a veteran’s know-how when they get to the paint. Keyonte George and Isaiah Collier can get to the rim, but they’re probably going to make it pretty obvious that the ball is going up. Enter Philadelphia’s young shot blocker, who is game to challenge you whenever he thinks you’re even going to give him a chance to block a shot.

Bona still isn’t ready for primetime against the good teams, but he could be the difference between wins and losses against the other teams at the bottom of the standings. For one, he’s capable of moving his feet and sliding with a guard on a switch, which sets him apart from both Andre Drummond and Guerschon Yabusele (and, gulp, compromised Joel Embiid). Bona has a lot of work to do as a big in drop schemes, but you can switch him pretty freely as long as he doesn’t commit silly reach-in fouls. He’s an outstanding athlete, and clearly takes pride in the act of playing defense.

I also think this season has shown that Bona is not quite as raw on offense as we thought coming in. He has shown increased comfort in a variety of different actions, and he’s starting to learn the nuances of pick-and-rolls as he goes along — when to slip a screen, how hard he can get away with setting a pick

— Alex Reese has been pretty good in limited minutes, though not necessarily in the ways I would have expected when they signed him. He’s billed as something like a stretch four at 6’9″ with good touch, but he has been surprisingly effective as a dirty work player. Reese has popped up to take charges, pull down the occasional offensive rebound, and even get some work done as an off-ball cutter. His instincts have been pretty good for a guy who is new to the system and his teammates.

— For all of his flaws, Ricky Council IV basically always responds after taking a trip down to the G-League to get minutes/reps and rediscover himself. He still has plenty of warts that were on display against Utah, but he knocked down a couple of threes and played mostly effective basketball. No sulking, no pouting, just hooping.

The Bad

— I genuinely feel like I am spiraling into madness recapping each and every game from this season. Trying to analyze this Toilet Bowl is an exercise in futility. What forward-looking analysis am I supposed to offer watching Jared Butler and Lonnie Walker lighting up the bench of a 15-48 Jazz team? Doing the paint by numbers “this happened, then that happened, this this happened” recap is boring as hell and I won’t do it, no sir.

The Ugly

— Giving up 30+ points in a quarter to this Utah Jazz team is a tanking feat I can hardly fathom. The Jazz are horrible with their starters available, and their injured list was so long on Sunday evening that when you combined it with the Sixers it took up more than a full page on a PDF. Impressive, if not for its impact on the Sixers trying to race to the bottom.

Even still, Philly managed to let Utah waltz to the rim and bomb away from three for the first 10 minutes or so of the game. Kyle Filipowski looked like The Chief in One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, running rim to rim with his hands in the air to deposit easy two-point baskets over and over again. Philadelphia lost containment on pick-and-rolls and pick-and-pops alike, and found themselves losing by double digits to one of the only teams in the league tanking harder than they are. A spectacular lack of give a damn from all five guys on the floor early on.

Andre Drummond, though, was probably the worst of them all. He failed to close space, failed to protect the rim, and failed to rebound. Adem Bona checked in and immediately changed the tenor of the game by simply playing hard. It doesn’t take a lot, and that brings up an important point. The Sixers might have better “name” players and guys you’d want next to their big three if they were trying to win, but if you’re a bad team down the stretch, I’d pick them to lose out sooner than I would most of the young and worse teams.

The young teams like Utah will be quite bad themselves, but the roster is filled with guys who are out to prove themselves and build a name in the league. Philly has a few guys like that, a couple of more guys with future contracts to think about, but they also have a decent collection of vets liable to play checked out hoops for the next month. Apathy is a powerful component in a tanking battle.

Anyway, Drummond sat the entire second half, and he had an excuse to struggle because he was playing through illness to be available. Either he or they must have decided it was time to call it quits at halftime, and I don’t blame him. Might have helped the tank cause for him to stay on the floor, of course…

— Anyone who wants to go into full rebuild mode might want to take a look at this Utah Jazz team and season before journeying back down that road. Everyone wants to be Oklahoma City, but a lot of teams will likely end up more like Utah, with a couple of nice players (when they’re healthy) and a whole lot of junk, in search of a team-driving star to change their fortunes.

— Since the basketball doesn’t mean anything right now, this is a good testing ground for a broader Sixers theory I have. Part of the reason they are doomed to fail is that they fail the Ninja Turtles test.

Most successful groups/teams include personality types that broadly fit into the turtle archtypes: Leonardo (Type A/leader), Michaelangelo (funny guy), Donatello (tech guy/brains), Rapheal (hard ass). The Sixers have two obvious candidates to fill two roles among their leaders. Tyrese Maxey is very obviously a Leonardo, brimming with cliches in press conferences and (by choice and by default) leading the team on the floor. Joel Embiid is Mikey, the class clown who is super powerful when he locks in but who needs the seriousness of a couple of his brothers.

But they are certainly missing the hard-charging, borderline insane Raphael, who often frustrates his other brothers but ultimately falls in line and helps drive them forward with his force of personality. They also had their Donatello in Nic Batum, though they didn’t lose him for lack of trying. Without half of what makes a group of personalities work, they’re swimming upstream with no chance to beat the current.

Anyway, this is all to say Jimmy Butler is a much better fit than Paul George, in this essay I will…

— Nick Nurse is clearly not onboard with the tank after that challenge he made in the final five seconds of the game. Organizational malpractice.