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The Sixers held an open practice yesterday at the historic Palestra. Since I live about a mile away from there, I decided to walk over and check things out. With that being said: I planned on doing a recap/notes thing, but nobody wants to read that on a Sunday more than a week before the year starts.
Trust me. I could go on for days about Thaddeus Young taking two charges in a scrimmage. I could wax poetic (or lyrical, even) about Kwame Brown being there and wearing something that appeared to be basketball pant-style capris. In fact, you've probably already stopped reading, closed the tab, and decided to turn on something NFL-related because, gosh, why would anyone care about this ever?
So we're not talking about practice. Instead, we're going to have a pop quiz! GET EXCITED! Let's play "Is This Guy A Sixer Or Nah?!"
While watching the scrimmage, it seemed like most people had a lot of trouble recognizing who was who. From the UPenn and Drexel students with little to do on a Saturday morning to the families with kids who could see the Sixers free of charge to the die-hards like me just checking out the roster, everyone had some trouble with the team. The players wore practice jerseys with no identifiers, so only the familiar players were really noticeable. Spencer Hawes is really tall and pale, Evan Turner is somewhat world famous, and Thaddeus Young stands out with his charge-taking and wild dribbling from end-to-end.
But for instance: I somehow confused Vander Blue and Tony Wroten for, like, 10 minutes during the scrimmage even though I already knew what Wroten looked like and had an idea who Vander was. When something like this happens to me, and I write about the team relatively often, I can't imagine what a casual fan has to think.
The rules of this game are simple: if the player is currently on the 76ers training camp roster, answer yes to continue. If the player is not a Sixer, you've failed. Almost is not good enough, you. But we'll start it off easy for you.
ROUND 1
Kwame Brown
...
Just kidding, that's a trick question. There's no answer. He just is.
REAL ROUND 1 (The Lee Nailon Round)
Khalif Wyatt
Arnett Moultrie
Josh Anderson
Furkan Aldemir
...
...
Okay, time's up! The answers, of course, were yes, yes, no, and no. We have a James Anderson, and he's wonderful, while Furkan Aldemir will remain overseas for at least another year. This is just a warm-up for later. Let's go to the second round!
ROUND 2 (The Michael Bradley Round)
Rodney Williams
Tim Olbrecht
Daniel Orton
Darren Morris
...
...
...
Time's up!
Here, the answers are yes, no, yes, and no! The Sixers have a Darius Morris, while Tim Olbrecht got waived three days ago to bring in Orton. And Rodney Williams is here and he's... crazy athletic, I guess.
ROUND 3! FINAL ROUND!
Kwame Brown
...
Fine, I'll stop. I'm sorry.
(No I'm not)
REAL ROUND 3! REAL FINAL ROUND! (The Amal McCaskill Round)
Arsalan Kazemi
Gani Lawal
Doc Warhal
Mac Koshwal
Harris Thompson
Solomon Alabi
...
...
...
...
TIME'S UP!
If you get all these correct, you've passed the quiz! Your Round 3 answers:
No, yes, no, yes, no, and no!
Kazemi is playing in his home country of Iran, the team waived Alabi to sign Gani Lawal, it's Hollis and not Harris Thompson, and I made that other guy up. If you got them all, congratulations! Like me, you care way too much about this beautiful disaster of a team! If not, no shame in messing up in Round 3, you failures.