Box Score

Pounding the Rock

If you didn't watch the game, the Sixers we're down 40-19 after the first quarter. San Antonio hit 15 threes. The Sixers battled back to tie it only to have their hearts broken by an offensive rebound followed by a game winner at the hands of Tony Parker. The shot was a difficult rainbow-fadeaway at the buzzer and it was absolutely devastating.

I'm in no condition to write a coherent recap, so I'll go with the good old, scrambled observations approach.

-Games like these from Andre Iguodala make me want to take back every negative thing I've ever said about him. He played one of the most complete games I've ever seen from him. It would've been awesome if he could've topped it off with a game-winner, but never got the chance. He was 10-15 from the field, 5-5 from the line, had 25 points, 8 boards and 8 assists. Not to mention a few monster dunks. MONSTER.

-Say what you want about Andre Miller. He made a questionable pass, thus committing a bad turnover at the end of the game and "allowed" Tony Parker to get the offensive rebound and hit the game-winner, but it was because of Andre Miller that the Sixers were even in the game. He committed only one turnover and was 12-14 from the field. He looked like an all-star tonight.

-Theo Ratliff played great defense down the stretch.

-Speights played 18 minutes, but none in the second half. He's nowhere near as good defensively as Ratliff or Dalembert and that's why he didn't play in the second half. Once he improves his defense the sky's the limit.

-Lou had another solid game off the bench. It wasn't spectacular, just solid.

-It cannot be said enough. Willie Green is absolute garbage. I dislike him a lot.

-Thad Young continues to show flashes and that jump hook is starting to look less like luck and more like skill. I'm confused on why he didn't play in crunch time and why Royal Ivey, of all people, took his minutes. He should've been out there. 

-The Sixers showed a ton of heart tonight and hung in there with the Spurs. I'm proud of the team tonight and even though they lost they did a lot of good things. No one likes to lose like that, but they could've easily laid down and gotten blown out after the 40-19 first quarter, but they didn't and played one heck of a game.

That's right folks. 3-0 under new head coach Tony DiLeo. Let's find it in our hearts to look past the three (Well, two. They just played one twice.) horrible teams they feasted on. Coach DiLeo is now 2-0 against the Washington Wizards, but it was far from a blowout.

I ended up watching the first half intently, then was forced to tape the second half for numerous reasons. The first being, I had to wrap ALL my Christmas presents, since we're opening them tomorrow--kind of lame I know, but we're leaving for Connecticut on Sunday. Another reason was I had to attend a friend of mine's little brother's high school basketball game. It was much more entertaining than I thought it would be, especially since the couple next to me were yelling such horrible things to the refs, cops actually had to show up. The game itself was a blowout, an all-athletic black team vs. 12 slow white guys didn't bode well for my friend's brother's team. Finally we watched The Promotion and I don't recommend it at all. Don't let Stifler and John C. Riley fool you; it sucked. It's funny that I write this stuff like you care and/or it's interesting because it's not, but I felt the need to throw it in.

After all my extracurricular activity and the successful quest to shield myself from any NBA scores I finished watching the game and since I'm tired as balls, I'm going to give you my thoughts in a short and sweet list. Here...we...go.

-Andre Miller is a monster. I take back every bad thing I've ever said about him. I still think Philly should try and trade him, but not because I don't like him, because he's old and in a contract year, and oh yeah, this team isn't very good. Send him to a contending team while he's still got something left, because the Sixers are at least a year or two away from being serious contenders.

-Again, tonight was not as easy a win as I thought it would be, but in the NBA and with the 2008-2009 Philadelphia 76ers nothing anything is possible.

-No Brand=No falling asleep. The Sixers gave up 103 points. Whatever. They won the game and it was entertaining to watch.

-I love Louis Williams. He's on fire and earning that contract. DiLeo loves him too and it shows with his 28 minutes per game since he became head coach.

-The Lou-Will/Mo Speights connection. Those alley-oop dunks are fan-tastic. They're the future of this team.

-Sometimes I can't stand Andre Iguodala. From the bricked jumpers, to the complaining, to the fancy-pass-attempt-turnover, to the missed free throws, sometimes I wonder why he got paid so much money.

-Willie Green and Sammy D combined for 30 minutes. That's so awesome.

-I'm still not sure why Theo plays. Speights should be getting all of his minutes.

-Kareem Rush can be effective in short stretches.

Overall it was a fun game to watch and I'm glad we pulled out the win. Nothing is going to be easy with this team from here on out, so we should take whatever we can get. Someone mentioned an Iguodala-bad-shot counter and until I figure out how to make it a widget on the website, I'll bust it out in the recaps. Tonight's number was 2. Iggy had a fadeaway airball and a pull up jumper that hit nothing but the backboard. By the way no one was covering him on the second shot.

It's time to hit the sack now. Tonight's basically my Christmas Eve, so I suppose I should get a little sleep. Tomorrow we get the Pacers at home before beginning our brutal road trip. It starts at 4:35 my time, which will be my pre-game Dallas Cowboys time, so I'll be watching the game, but not until the Cowboys game is over. The game thread will still be here though, for those of you who want to chit-chat. Until then, peace, love and happiness. 

Wow, first let me start by saying I've had an interesting day. It's began with two cortisone-like shots in my wrist and elbow and ended with a Sixers victory with a flurry of snow and an Elton Brand Dislocated/Seperated shoulder, depending on who you talk to, in between. 

First the snow. Why is it significant? Because I live in Vegas. It hardly rains here and never, ever snows. Well, today it did and no one knew how to react. Driving was a nightmare and I missed the entire game because of it. Luckily, I had a gut feeling I should tape the game when I woke up this morning. Normally I would be insanely upset that I missed a game and had to watch the recorded version due to anything, but I fully enjoyed the whole snow fiasco considering it will probably never happen again. Three inches here is like 10 feet of snow somewhere else. Check it out.

To the game. It wasn't as easy of win as I thought it would be. I knew the Bucks had talent, but one guy I didn't mention pre-game was that dude who's name I will never pronounce correctly. Luc Richard Mbah a Moute, I believe. He was all over the place and was basically a replica of Andre Iguodala, ugly jumpshots and all. His defense was pretty impressive. He was also the player who took out Elton Brand, or at least stood there while Elton took out himself. More on that in a minute. The Sixers fought their way back into the game and pulled out a victory. 2-0 for DiLeo. Here's what I liked and didn't like.

Likes:

-Lou-Will is really back to his old self. He's getting to the rim, he's getting to the foul line and playing a meaningful role during the crunch times of games, just like last season. I think the biggest reason for his turnaround is consistent playing time. Early in the season Lou would get in for short bursts and try to do way too much. Now he's getting in the game for long stretches and doing his thing. 25 points on 17 shots tonight. Not bad, not bad at all. He led all scorers.

-Andre Miller. He's really ballin' as of late. He looks like the Andre Miller who led the team to the playoffs last year and I'm not sure whether it's best to roll with him as the point guard and extend him, or to trade him during his hot streak. I'm leaning toward the latter because I'm ready to get a little younger and let Lou take his shot at starting point guard to see what we have before making any drastic moves in the off-season.

-Tony DiLeo's substitutions. He's using a 9 man-rotation. He's giving everyone the minutes I think they deserve and he's not playing Ivey, Ratliff and Marshall. I love that he plays Lou a lot more than Cheeks did and the same with Speights.

-Mo Speights. M16 had 12-7 in 18 minutes tonight. He was all over the court, dunking on people's skulls, taking charges, snatching rebounds. Our boy put together a very nice game and the 17-20 minutes per game range is very fair for M16.

Dislikes:

-The Elton Brand injury. I haven't really read anything on it yet, but it didn't look good when it happened and it doesn't sound good either. If you've ever played basketball, you've been a part of the play where someone under the basket catches the ball and pump fakes, a defender falls for the pump fake, goes flying by and lands painfully on the court. That's exactly what happened to Brand, but he used his arm to try and soften his fall and dislocated/separated his shoulder. That sucks if he's out for the season, but it might allow Stefanski to unload Miller and/or Sam and look toward next season. We'll see.

-Andre Iguodala. I don't really want to get into it, but he was bad, really bad.

From Phil Jasner

Brand will have an MRI exam, but his long-term prognosis is unknown.

I'll wait on the tests to form my opinion on what the Sixers should do. Until then, peace love and happiness. I'm going to go make a snowball, throw it at someone, then play some Madden. Stay sexy.

Cavs 88 Sixers 72

To be completely honest, this was one of the most boring games of the year. The Sixers kept it close for the first 12 minutes. The score was 25-25 after the first quarter, but you never got the sense that the Sixers were actually "in" the game. From then on, the game was not entertaining at all.

No one expected the Sixers to win this game. Even I predicted them to lose by 14, so the 16-point loss went according to plan. I'm not going to pull the old, "Disappointed" card anymore, because along with everyone else, I've lowered my expectations and a blowout loss to one of the top three NBA teams on the road doesn't surprise me or disappoint me. They went into Cleveland. They suited up. And they lost. Like a donut-filled, flat-top wearing man once said, "They are who we thought they were."

Here are some quick observations:

-Andre Iguodala continues to trend upward. The jumpshot is looking smooth and he's getting to the rim again.

-Andre Miller isn't completely killing the team by taking 40 shots a game anymore. He was off tonight, he realized it and stopped shooting. Good for you Andre.

-Willie Green played well. Bravo Willie.

-Dalembert played decent. Don't mistake decent for good, because that he was not, but I'll give him decent.

-Thad played much better tonight.

-Elton Brand looked horrendous once again. He's not healthy. I'm 100% sure of that. Can we have a refund?

-Speights got two minutes. If we are going to keep losing at least play the young fella Mo.

-The Sixers missed Lou Williams tonight, who sat out with the flu. It was disappointing because he has really been turning it around as of late.

What a sorry start to the weekend, but hey, I'm excited. I'm done with school. Christmas shopping it is. Tomorrow night the Sixers play the Wizards in Philadelphia. It's a very winnable game and I expect it to be close and entertaining. That's all for tonight, but I want to leave you guys with a YouTube clip I discovered today. It's a nice way to get your mind off the Sixers.

Here it is!

Player of the Game: Iggy

Box score

Record: 9-14 (As FuqaManuel predicted. Congrats FqM.)

Favorite Open Thread Comment: "BIlly King was the anti-christ."-Sexy T-Rex

It's been a while, so this might get ugly. I'll probably spurt off into a couple of tangents. Bare with me. 

Today, December 11th, marks the end of my finals which means I have a month free of papers, exams and all the stuff that goes along with college. Yes! The past week or has felt like hibernation. I've barely turned on my TV. I've barely used my computer for pleasure (I love to re-read my post to find dirty sounding sentences, and leave them in regardless). I've been buried in papers, finals, work and working out. Last night I weened my way back into the sports world and it was like I never left. The Sixers continued their disappointing season with another loss (which I'll get to in a second) and today I reluctantly turned on ESPN and find out Romo and T.O. are having a conflict. Awesome. I don't like ESPN anymore and I have my reasons.

Anyway, today begins the four-week vacation I've been anticipating forever. My work hours will be bumped back up to 40 a week and I'm going to try and hit the gym before the holidays, so I'll still be a busy dude, but not nearly as busy as I have been for the past week or so. Why do you care? Well, you might have noticed Liberty Ballers has been lonely during finals, but I'm here to tell you that I'm going to be posting much like I was before finals and I'm going to do everything in my power to improve the site before school starts again. I'm going to attempt to add new features, possibly a  new writer (Please don't ask me; I'll ask you), a skilled graphic designe who's also a Sixer fan (That's going to be difficult) and whatever else I can think of along the way.

The only bump in the road during next four weeks will be the week of December 21-27. I'll be in Connecticut, yeah Connecticut, celebrating Christmas with my family. I'll probably bring my laptop, but I know from experience, every year, the week that I'm there usually means no TV, computer or sports for me. I'll do my best to update the site everyday, but I can't promise anything. This could possibly be an audition for a writing position with Preview/Recap FanPosts. The games I'll miss are @ Boston and @ Denver.

Now to the Sixers, who sit at 9-13. Here are some observations I have what's been going on lately.

Andre Iguodala has really been rounding into form as of late. His line for the month of December looks like this: 21 points, 8 rebounds, 5 assists, 1 steal, 1 block, 53% shooting and 79% from the foul line. He's still turning the ball over too much and shooting poorly from beyond the arch, but I'll take 21-8-5 from Iggy any day. His last game was the most impressive. He nearly played a perfect game, guarding LeBron, taking smart jumpers, making smart passes, limiting the turnovers and rebounding the basketball. Hopefully this trend continues. 

(Random: I still haven't turned off ESPN, and Thank God I didn't because I just got marriage advice from Michael Wilbon, "Threesomes keep it interesting." Thanks Wilbon.)

Andre Miller is looking like the player who balled himself into a career year last season. I'd bust out some numbers for you (actually I probably wouldn't because I'm lazy), but why do that when I can just hook you up with a link from my boy, Brian's website. Miller's getting his legs under him.

Cheeks is fighting for his job by changing rotations and changing starting lineups. He's done a few things I've liked, like moving Thad to the bench and Willie into the starting lineup. Don't get me wrong, I'm the biggest Willie Green hater there is, but this lineup is beneficial because it allows for the Lou-Thad combination to come off the bench and provide spark to the second unit and it allows Andre Iguodala to play his natural position. And I don't know if you've noticed, but Iggy at small forward is a lot better than Iggy at shooting guard. I'm also a fan of Cheeks playing Donyell more. He's shown he can rebound, play solid defense and shoot the three. He deserves to be in the rotation. 15-20 minutes should do the trick.

Speaking of Thaddeus, he's really struggled lately. He's finally starting to look like the 21-year-old, second year player that he really is. In December Thad is averaging 8 points, shooting 33% and 14% from downtown.

Elton Brand has been injured and I hope that's the reason he looked like Reggie Evans last night. Six points on 27% shooting and seven turnovers is not going to cut it. He keeps saying he's healthy, but he looked far from it against Cleveland last night.

Sammy D sucks and is slowly losing his job.

Lou Williams is back to the old Lou Williams. He's scoring, he's playing a better point guard and he's doing most of his damage in crunch time--the fourth quarter. He's shooting 48% and scoring 14 points a game in December. He's not necessarily shooting jumpers better, but he's getting to the hoop and finishing around the rim. His free throws attempts have also doubled.

Speights fever has tailed off. He's still a monster talent, but he's going through some growing pains. I'm not too upset about his playing time, but he should definitely get the nod over Theophilus Ratliff in most scenarios.

The Sixers are 9-13 after 22 games and I've revised my season expectations. My expectations are now much like last years. If we get in the playoffs we do and if we don't we don't. If we get in and make some noise, I'll be geeked, but I don't expect the Sixers to contend for a championship anytime soon. For the last 3/4 of the season I want to see growth from players like Lou, Iggy, Thad and Speights. I want to see the coaching situation to be resolved. I want to see one of Ed's "plans" put into effect, whatever that might be. And I want to see the Sammy D, Andre Miller situations resolved.

Tomorrow night they get another shot at King James and the Cavs, in Cleveland. Good luck Sixers; your going to need it.

Wow. I have mixed feelings about this game. I just finished watching the recorded version (apparently it wasn't blacked out) with one of my good friends, who so happens to be a Lakers fan. There's nothing like talking up players like Marreese Speights, saying things like, "Watch, you'll see, he's something special." I am now going to live that down until the rematch in Staples. Marreese backed me up with a scoreless five minutes and four personal fouls game. Thanks Mo. 

As for the game, I thought the Sixers played very well as team, much better than I expected. The Andre's carried the them, but it wasn't enough to beat a very, very good Laker team. Iguodala built on his season-best performance with his second straight 19+ point game. His jumpshot is looking smoother and he's starting to get to the rim like he used to. I really think the minutes he's getting at small forward have been beneficial. As for the other Andre, Andre Miller played an outstanding game. I usually don't have many nice things about Miller, but tonight, he was by far the Sixers best player. He was an efficient 11-21 from the floor, scoring 26 points. He also has eight rebounds, five assists, two steals and only one turnover. He played his best game of the season and I was very pleased with what I saw. 

Besides the Andre's play, the Sixers also cut down on their turnovers, committing only 12 and shot a solid 48% from the floor. The bottom line is, the Lakers are a much better team, and they proved it tonight. Besides the fact that Elton Brand looked more like Reggie Evans than Elton Brand out there tonight, which I'll get to in a second, I thought the Sixers played outstanding (Ok, not outstanding, but better that they've played all year against a good team) basketball. The problem is, they still lost by 12 points. Kobe Bryant was ridiculous. I can't put in to words how good he was tonight. Every time the Sixers would make a run Kobe would answer. The crowd said it best at the end when they chanted "M-V-P". 

Another observation I made about the game in general is the fact that it was horribly officiated. I usually don't complain about the refs, but I think this was a poorly officiated games, for both teams.

On to Elton Brand. My God. He looked like a boy among men tonight. His line of three points and five rebounds is not why Stefanski paid him the big bucks. I'll just chalk it up as a bad night for EB, but I sure hope he shows a little more in future games against contenders like the Lakers. My friend, who I watched the game with actually has him on his fantasy team. He was disgusted, to say the least.

Before writing this recap I looked at the box score for the first time and I was shocked to see that Thaddeus had 17-8. During the game, there were a couple of plays were I found myself saying, "Thaddeus! What are you doing?" I don't know if it was like that for anybody else, but his 17 points didn't seem like a meaningful 17 points. And here's a random observation on Thad, he reminds me a lot of Lamar Odom. I think that's his ceiling, a rich man's Lamar Odom.

Lou, Ivey and Green pretty much sucked. The game completely changed when Andre Miller was spelled by one of these guys. Lou is not a point guard, the real Royal Ivey showed himself tonight and Willie Green is still Willie Green. Lou dropped 15 in the fourth quarter, very reminiscent to last year, but that was with Andre Miller at the point and Iggy at the three. I'm very intrigued to see a Lou-Thad switch in the starting lineup. Thaddeus wouldn't be getting demoted, but it would allow both Lou and Iggy to play at their natural positions.

As for the Speights-Dalembert lineup switch, not so fast my friend. Dalembert played a very solid game tonight, nothing spectacular, but solid and Speights didn't look good at all. Either the team rolls with the vets like Miller and Dalembert or goes the other direction and trades one, the other, or both. As of right now, Speights isn't ready. I'll admit, tonight I jumped off the "Bench Sam, start Speights" bandwagon an I'm going to stay off for the time being. 

I'm not sure why Theo was playing though. I'd much rather see Speights or even Evans over him. The team was -18 with him on the court.

Overall, I'm happy with the Sixers effort and performance tonight. The Lakers are legitimate championship contenders. The Sixers aren't, at least not yet. Tonight's game was a building block. Normally that's not the case after a home loss, but besides Elton Brand's suckfest, the Sixers played well. They even played some solid defense. Some of the shots the Lakers made were indefensible, especially Kobe's.

Player of the Game: Andre Miller

Box score

Record: 8-11

Favorite Open Thread Comment: "i watched the interview during DNL today and he mentioned the fact that he likes to plan. He said that he has a plan if the team keeps under-performing and he has a plan if they start to roll. He did say that he has not yet decided after how many games he should pull the trigger if the team is still under-performing. I also like how he says he is also a fan. It seems like too many execs today aren’t really fans of the team, they just work for them."-Ben16

via assets.espn.go.com

I've seen enough. The Sixers were out-played, out-classed and out-coached in every aspect of the game tonight. The Celtics showed why they are the defending champs, playing ferocious defense, displaying intensity, hunger, heart and all those cliche terms used to describe a championship team. The Sixers were the anti-Celtics tonight. They looked confused and one of my least favorite announcers, Tommy Heinsohn put it best when he said the Sixers looked like they were thinking, "We cannot beat this team." He was absolutely right. As currently assembled, the Sixers are not a championship team, they are not contenders and they might not even be a playoff team.

(Here are a couple quick things I liked that I didn't want to get lost in the shuffle of the horrible game:

-Elton Brand came to play tonight. He's starting to look like the guy we all thought he would be. He came out and score 18 points on 8-14 shooting, grabbed 8 boards and did not commit a single turnover. Bravo Elton, bravo.

-Lou-Will had a vintage Lou-Will line. I'm not worried that it was in garbage time, because that's where he got most of his playing time at the beginning of last season. This game can be a nice confidence builder and maybe he'll get back on track. Tommy Heinsohn was obsessed with him. He scored 15 points on seven shots, dropped 6 dimes, got 3 steals and went turnover-less. Love me some Lou-Will.

-Marreese Speights had some nice dunks in garbage time, and a hard foul with 43 seconds remaining. It got him ejected, but at least he showed he isn't afraid of the big, bad Celtics. He has a lot of elements. He needs more playing time.)

I'm fully aware that 16 games into the season is not a good time to pronounce and team dead and I'm not doing that. I'm saying, without some sort of change this team will not be good and I think that is very evident after watching the first 16 games. A change needs to be made, and made soon. I cannot reiterate that point enough. Before I delve into anything else I want to look at the upcoming schedule.

Next 7 games:

Chicago

@Chicago

Lakers

@Pistons

New Jersey

Cleveland

@Cleveland

If the Sixers play like they have been, they could easily lose six of their next seven or all seven. The Bulls are all of a sudden playing solid basketball and I don't know if you've heard, but they have a monster point guard by the name of Derrick Rose. I can't wait to see how badly he destroys Andre Miller. The Lakers are probably the best team in the NBA. The Pistons are still good and you know Iverson is going to get himself up for that game. The game against the Nets is winnable, but not a foregone conclusion with a backcourt of Devin Harris and Vince Carter able to go off any given night. Then two straight vs. the Cavs, who are destroying every one in their path right now, led by King James. That would leave this team sitting at either 8-15 or 7-16. If that happens and a move isn't made immediately, I'd be shocked.

What kind of changes are we talking about? Well, there are some possibilities.

1. Fire Maurice Cheeks.

The consensus among Sixers fans has been this change indeed. The poor half-court offense can be put on Cheeks for not having good enough plays, if any, or offensive sets. The poor defensive rotations can be put on Cheeks for not coaching the players on when to leave their man and when not to leave their man. Ray Allen shot 21,567 uncontested shots tonight and while it was good for my fantasy team, it should never happen with a shooter as good as Jesus Shuttleworth. The poor substitutions are definitely all Mo's fault. He needs to stop playing Willie Green, Reggie Evans and his new favorite player Theo Ratliff. Marreese Speights needs to be on the court; he brings so much more to the team. So what if he makes a couple rookie mistakes, he's still way better than Evans and Ratliff. I'm still convinced that if Stefanski didn't step in last year, Thad and Lou would still be stuck on the end of the bench and Philly wouldn't have sniffed the playoffs.

No one is questioning whether Cheeks is a good person. I like him as a person, just not as a coach. We all remember this. He seems to know his players and his players seem to like playing for him. He's probably pretty basketball smart, being the point guard of a championship team, but for whatever reason it doesn't translate to his coaching. Usually when a team with a lot of talent and expectations fails to live up to the hype, the finger is pointed at the coach. There is no way this team should be 7-9 and possibly even worse in the next week or so. It might not be completely Mo Cheeks' fault, but he'll be the first one to go if things continue.

Possible replacements are Avery Johnson, Jeff Van Gundy or Eddie Jordan. I have no explanation on why I threw those names out there. They seem like logical choices, but as I've learned throughout my sports fandom, things never work out the way I think they should. If Cheeks was fired the Sixers would probably hire someone the fans like even less than Cheeks. It'd be a change nonetheless, and that is what's needed.

2. Trade either Andre Miller, Samuel Dalembert or both.

Andre Miller has been garbage all season. From the games where he tried to take over to the stupid half-court shot with three seconds left (sorry, I just can't let it go) he completely sucks. He's shooting 42% on the season and if history tells us anything, it's that his shooting percentages aren't very good when he's teamed with Elton Brand. When they played together on the Clippers his field goal percentage dropped from 45% the previous year to 40%. Sound familiar? Last year he shot 49%. That's far from his 42% this year. The common denominator in the huge drop off is Elton Brand and he isn't going anywhere.

The question remains, what kind of trade value does Andre Miller have? Not much. The only two contenders I can find that might be interested in a veteran point guard are the Blazers and Rockets and I'm not sure they'd rather have Andre Miller instead of Steve Blake or Rafer Alston respectively. Both Blake and Alston stretch the defense. Miller doesn't. The only value Miller might have is an expiring contract, which carries a little more weight these days with the summer of 2010 fastly approaching.

What would I want in return for Miller. A capable shooter with enough talent to be our starting point guard for the time being. I even like the idea of acquiring a shooting guard who can actually shoot and start the Andre Iguodala-point guard experiment. That would never happen though; the Sixers aren't that desperate yet.

On to Samuel Dalembert. He's overpaid. He has the lowest basketball IQ in the NBA and is just standing in the way of a Marreese Speights explosion. I realize that sounds a bit inappropriate, but I'm going to leave it for comedy purposes. Point being, Speights is just as good, if not better than Dalembert at this point and much cheaper. Yes, Dalembert is a better defender... sometimes. Dalembert has shown stretches, or quarters where he absolutely shuts down the opponent's best big man, Tim Duncan and Kevin Garnett specifically, but that was last year. This year he has failed to do barely anything of value and if we aren't going to contend, we might as well get rid of our horrible contracts and get a little younger. Give Speights some time to develop and he will be a monster. 

The market for Dalembert would be higher than for Miller. The Pistons could use a center, the Heat could use one, the Mavericks, the Spurs, just to throw some names out there.

3. Make a lineup change

This could go hand-in-hand with number two. If Miller or Dalembert is traded, obviously their would be a change in the starting lineup. Otherwise, I think this is the least drastic and most realistic change possible. Cheeks might attempt to save his job and bench Dalembert for Speights. Dalembert did play very well off the bench early in his career. Thad or Iguodala could also be moved to the bench, not necessarily as a demotion, but to help the second unit. The first unit obviously isn't clicking and a Lou-Iggy backcourt in the second unit would be pretty productive. I'm open to nearly any lineup change as long as it doesn't involve Willie Green. Don't even get me started on him. He needs to be cut.

Something needs to be done and I think it will be after the upcoming seven game stretch. I have faith in the greatest GM on planet earth.

Player of the Game: Elton Brand

Box score

Record: 7-9

Favorite Open Thread Comment: "And that was goaltending on the pussy"-jemagee

Man, I don't even know where to start. The Sixers sucked in the first half, but were somehow still in the game. Then the Magic started sucking in the second half and the Sixers took the lead. (In depth analysis, I know.) And in the end, Rashard, or Rasheed Lewis, as Hubie Brown likes to call him, hit a corner three pointer to give the Magic a two-point lead. Thaddeus Young left him, bad perimeter D yet again. The game wasn't over though. There was still 4.7 seconds remaining, which is plenty of time to get a clean look at the basket. Plus, the Sixers can call timeout and advance the ball right? No. Mo Cheeks decided to leave zero timeouts for the end of the game. Surprise. Regardless, 4.7 seconds is a reasonable amount of time to dribble the ball up court, make a pass or two and get a good shot off. That's far from what happened. The Sixers supposed veteran, savvy, point guard decides to dribble for a total of 1.7 seconds before throwing up a contested half-court shot with 3 seconds remaining. Don't believe me? Take a look at the picture above, courtesy of my iPhone. It was a bonehead move, but I can't blame the loss on a single play, because there were plenty of other reasons Philly lost, and they are the same reasons why They've been losing games all season.

-Bad perimeter defense. 

-Nonexistent three point shooting.

-Lack of offensive sets.

-Horrendous coaching.

-Substitutions.

-Bench play, even though they did better tonight.

Bottom line is, the team has a ton of issues and they were lucky to even be in the game tonight. It's going to take some time to fix these problems and most people on this blog think firing Cheeks would resolve, or at least improve all of them and I really can't disagree. I'm not 100% on the "Fire Cheeks" bandwagon just yet, but I mean, how much more mediocre basketball does Sixers management have to see before making a change. This team obviously has some talent, but aren't showing it right now. Is that the players' fault or the coach's? It remains to be seen.

My two favorite things about this game were the play of Elton Brand and Marreese Speights. Brand had a really nice second half and put the team on his shoulders for stretches of the game. He's starting to show signs of the old EB. And Marreese Speights, wow. I predicted a big game for M16. I just felt it. Hubie Brown put it best when he said, "It's just his night." In 13 minutes Speights dropped 12 points, grabbed three boards, had a nice steal, took a charge and hit a half-court-buzzer-beater. Hmmm, maybe he should get some more playing time, just a suggestion.

By the way, Hubie is a lame announcer, but he was entertaining. He was eeriely aroused by Dwight Howard's body and uttered the sentence, "I like Willie Green." Your a bad man Hubie. 

I'm sure I'll have some posts up tomorrow, but if not, or if everyone's too busy to comment, have a happy Thanksgiving and don't do anything I wouldn't do.

Player of the Game: Elton Brand

Box score

Record: 7-8

Favorite Open Thread Comment: "Dwight Howard has the most beautiful arms/shoulders in the NBA. Like a greek god. And no, I am not gay."--FuquaManuel

What if the Sixers continue to suck? Do they trade Andre Miller and/or Andre Iguodala and Sammy D?

If they play like they have been much longer, you better believe these rumors are going to be discussed. As much as people might regret that huge Iguodala contract, he's not going anywhere. Stefanski isn't going to unload his young, supposed franchise player for anything and unfortunately I don't think he has another option. 

Samuel Dalembert is a different story. He's going to turn 28 before next summer and that's kinda sorta old for a guy who has very little basketball skills/IQ and relies strictly on his athleticism. Dalembert is the Sixers' best one-on-one low-post defender and a very good rebounder; there's no doubt about that. But is a 28 year old center, with 33 million left on his contract valuable to a possibly mediocre team? No. His defense could definitely help a contender and if the Sixers fall completely out of the race at any point this season, I think a trade of Sammy D has to be examined. Not to mention the fact that that would give Speights a chance to get some serious run.

Andre Miller is the player most likely to get traded if the Sixers fall out of it prior to the deadline. He's an old point guard, who sucks super hard right now, but he's an expiring contract and might be appealing to a team in need for a veteran point guard. Thank God Stefanski didn't give him that extension in the off-season because things aren't looking too good for Andre right now. If the Sixers play like we all thought they would, obviously Miller isn't going anywhere, but I don't think anyone would complain if Eddy could somehow get a valuable young point guard for Miller regardless of our record. Sergio Rodriguez anyone?

Now don't take this post the wrong way. I'm not saying, "Trade everybody! We suck! Stefanski is a horrible GM! We need to rebuild!" No, I'm not saying that. I'm just saying, if we are not contenders with this team as assembled, trading our veterans for younger talent is better than being a mediocre team for years to come, wasting years of Thad, Lou, Andre and M16's careers. Why not get even younger and letour studs grow together. After signing Brand, we can't rebuild per say, just re-stock. A promising young point guard is priority number one.