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

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

Here’s what I saw.

The Good

— In a transparent attempt to get younger at the deadline, Daryl Morey sought out Jared Butler and Quentin Grimes to bring some juice to a team with a pair of older stars. It’s far too early to judge how big of an impact they’ll have on this team, but I am already happy to watch guys alongside Embiid who don’t move at a glacial pace. Those two took the floor in a backup lineup with Embiid to open the second quarter, and you can see the outline of a group that can play effective two-way basketball.

Butler was trigger-happy but more than effective as their lead guard during those minutes, using a nifty hesitation move to blow past Gradey Dick for a particularly memorable bucket in the second quarter. When the Sixers were able to get stops with that lineup on the floor, Butler did a good job of navigating the early offense opportunities, making hit-ahead passes when necessary, and more often pushing the pace himself. It was a welcome sight for a backup point next to Embiid, particularly after watching Kyle Lowry and Reggie Jackson this season.

You could make a genuine argument that Butler was their second-best player on Tuesday. That’s damning with faint praise, of course, but he was their most reliable option to go and get a bucket out of the group of players not named Embiid. If you’re going to put a small guard on the floor, let it be one that has the legs to get past a defender multiple times a game. Sign me up for him as the backup point for now, and the fourth guard in the future with Maxey, McCain, and Grimes.

I have higher hopes for Grimes, who I think should get a look to start sooner rather than later. He is firmly one of the best, if not the best athlete on the team already, something he showcased with a blow-by for a dunk in the second quarter. The downside is that Grimes bit off a bit more than he could chew after getting the chance to start in the second half, taking some ill-advised jumpers and running the offense a bit too much, but the flashes were there.

In lineups where Embiid is the undisputed king of the court, you need guys with definitive niches, and I think they have that with a lot of their current young players. Butler is the ballhandler, Grimes is a shooter and point-of-attack defender, Yabusele is a big body with the ability to play hi-lo with Embiid, and then sprinkle in someone from the mix of Oubre/Council IV/Edwards depending on your need.

The Bad

— A game against this year’s Toronto Raptors should be easy money for Embiid. They have some interesting bigs on their roster to develop for the future, but mostly, they have guys who are too small and incapable of bothering Embiid on the defensive end.

Tuesday’s first half was a great example of Embiid just punishing bigs who have to try to compensate for the size/strength disadvantages by playing aggressive defense. The Raptors kept trying to poke the ball away and dislodge Embiid as he was in the middle of his wind-up for shots, and more often than not, they came up empty, swiping at air or making contact with an Embiid forearm en route to free throws for the big man.

I thought he did a nice job of attacking Toronto on the move, forcing them into tough decisions as they dealt with him methodically driving toward the rim. An overzealous Embiid can be a threat to barrel through defenders, but he showed a solid level of restraint, hitting some drop-off passes and kickouts as Raptors defenders tried to slide into his path for charges that never came. He had three assists by halftime, and I thought he probably deserved more based on the quality and timing of his passing.

Something I loved seeing in the second half? Embiid impacting the game as a rebounder. Though his vertical leaping ability isn’t what it used to be, Embiid spent a lot of the third quarter jostling for position near the basket as guards and shooters put up jumpers. He went from having two rebounds at halftime to hitting double digits before the third was up, tipping out misses to teammates for extra opportunities. And this was comfortably the best he has moved on defense in quite a while, not that there have been many games to measure this against. Embiid was the only thing stopping Toronto from a parade to the rim, and watching up close there were at least a few business decisions made rather than challenging him.

And then, in the most important moment of the game, Embiid just completely melted down. Maxey gift-wrapped him a wide-open trail three on a pick-and-pop with under 15 seconds to play, and rather than simply stepping into the open shot, Embiid drove into traffic and committed a turnover from what should have been an impossible situation. Erased all the good in a span of about five seconds. The season from hell does not let up.

— Tyrese Maxey scored zero points in the first half, which I didn’t even realize was possible for him at this point. But it did feel like an accurate reflection of his impact on the game and the team on Tuesday. No way around it, that was a stinker.

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 going with the full-strength lineup available. The Raptors did a good job of making him work at the point of attack, too, so he defaulted to moving the ball away from pressure and trying to let the offense run its course.

That excuse falls away when you’re deep into the second half with a goose egg on the board, though. There were opportunities for Maxey to attack, and he fell into a weirdly passive mode for some reason. Toronto threw a few zone looks at the Sixers and weren’t particularly crisp 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’d even think about taking the shot. It’s not like he’s in a bad run of form that he’d come in slightly gunshy — Maxey has been on a rampage for basically a month straight.

His fellow non-Embiid star was nearly as anonymous, though I suppose we’ve come to expect that. It was another Paul George game where you looked up at the third-quarter buzzer and wondered what exactly he was doing for most of the night. He is just floating through games night after night, failing to impose his will on either end of the floor.

Where I’ll give both of these guys a break is that it seems like Nick Nurse hasn’t figured out a good plan to maximize the talents of off-ball shooters. They’ll run the occasional flare screen and lean on dribble handoffs to get guys clean looks coming around an Embiid pick, but otherwise, there aren’t many designed plays being run to take advantage of their catch-and-shoot prowess. You’ll get the usual kick-outs and swing passes, but it’s pretty shocking that a team constantly running multiple miniature ballhandlers together doesn’t have a deeper bag of plays for off-ball weapons.

That said, you have to help yourself, and I didn’t think this was a game that was particularly Embiid-centric. He wasn’t a stopper for most of this game, making fairly quick decisions whether he was shooting or getting rid of the ball. Just a bad game for Maxey and George, I think.

— Though he has been one of the positive standouts this season for his effort and general availability, it has been a struggle for Kelly Oubre in recent weeks. I wouldn’t come close to blaming him for all of their defensive decision-making problems, but he has been a poster child for their ineffectiveness on that end. He cheats a little too hard, a little too often, constantly surrendering looks that are 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 a lot of his minutes daring him to try to punish them on offense, and Yabusele was ineffective, missing threes and layups alike. In fact, he was worse near the rim than he was as a three-point shooter, 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 by him so quickly a time or two that he might as well have been standing still. Tough night.

The Ugly

— If you are losing multiple times to this Raptors team in a single season, you should just pack the whole thing up.

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

— One of the reasons I think it’s important to distinguish between “soft” and “injury prone” is that the former is a mental issue and the latter is a physical problem that is often not in your control. You can be as tough as you want, but when your body fails you for any number of reasons (like dumb luck), it’s hard for me to generate animosity that you are injured. And while I think Embiid is undoubtedly injury-prone, I would never call him soft.

We saw that firsthand on Tuesday night, when Embiid got tied up underneath Toronto’s basket struggling for a ball near the rim., Wrestling to the floor to try to hold onto the ball, Embiid ended up getting slammed into the hardwood with his left arm absorbing the brunt of the force. He was in visible pain on the floor and after he popped up, to the point that he refused to use the left arm on the jump ball, leading to some chatter with official Ed Malloy.

But, of course, he kept on playing, as he has played through a lot of other bumps, bruises, falls, tears, and other problems along the way. It doesn’t make him being constantly injured less frustrating, it’s just something to consider before acting like the guy has no desire to be out there or isn’t willing to play through pain.