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The 76ers lost 101-90 to the Boston Celtics Wednesday night, marking their 11th loss in 11 games. In not-so-breaking news, the Sixers are not a good NBA team. They're bad enough that the tired "can the Sixers beat Kentucky??" argument has once again been recycled, though Kentucky appearing unstoppable does not exactly stop the rumors from happening either.
But in more important, less divisive news: can the Sixers get us cheaper pizza?
With 23 seconds left in Wednesday night's game, Tony Wroten went a rare 2 for 2 from the foul line. But less importantly, as the clock would down on a meaningless final possession, just as it has to end most Sixers games, Sixers play-by-play broadcaster Marc Zumoff uttered words which shook Philadelphia.
Noting that the Sixers just hit 90 points, seconds before the buzzer sounded for the final time, Zumoff muttered the Sixers faithful (or just anyone with the code - which is SIXERS btw - in the general area) could get 50% off Papa John's the day after by ordering online.
Wait, what?
Now, if a Sixers-Papa John's promotion sounds familiar, well, it is. The team replaced its free Big Macs promotion (which rewarded only fans in attendance when the team scored 100 points) with the discount Papa John's promotion (whenever the team wins). I italicized wins because that's a fair condition. The Sixers have not won, though, and thus sales of Papa John's have not been flowing in as expected. Furthermore, as the worst offensive team in the NBA by a large margin, even 100 points is pushing the boundaries in spite of the team's futility.
So Papa John's dropped the winning condition, instead opting to set a hilariously low point threshold of 90, one that 17 of a possible 22 teams surpassed during Wednesday night's action. The Sixers can lose by 562, but so long as 90 points are scored by the Sixers, you can get 50% off on pizza.
There's even an updated graphic, courtesy of Crossing Broad. Someone overlooked the email subject though - the Sixers haven't won, silly. BTB, person who sent that email. Subjects are hard.
The common joke upon the cross-promotional endeavor announcement was that Papa John's was getting free publicity without having to actually discount anything, because the Sixers organization is trying to lose games. However, nobody thought it would get to the point where they had to change the rules of pizza discounting during the season because the team is so bad.
Although now I guess I know where the NBA was coming from with lottery reform, which by the way, thanks Sam Presti!