Rob Mahoney Recaps the SI Top 100

about them on this episode of the broadcast. Yes, yes, yes, we are getting that much closer to the start of seeing and watching and observing some tangible basketball developments for two nineteen two twenty with the Philadelphia seventy Sixers. How you doing out there, seventy six Ers pod people, I'm Brian Seltzer. Yes, the start of training camp on Tuesday, October first is less than a week away. Cannot wait.

Media Days on Monday, and then things get rolling. In recent days and weeks, lots of media outlets out there have been pushing out and publishing their lists of player rankings for the season ahead and in the opinion of yours. Truly, there's none better than the one compiled by Rob Mahoney, our man from Sports Illustrated. It's a yearly thing that he and I have done going back a few seasons now, talking about the SI Top one hundred and the seventy

sixers who appear on that list this year. For twenty nineteen twenty Josh Richardson, Tobias Harris, Ben Simmons, Al Horford, and Joel Embiid, all of whom could very likely be the starting five for the seventy sixers, made it to the list, and we're going to dissect the rankings and what went into them with Rob in a moment. First, a reminder that to subscribe to the podcast, you can go to just about any one of your favorite podcasting platforms.

Type in Sixers podcast Network. You will then find our feed, subscribe, follow, do whatever you gotta do. In the offseason, we've had a new episode about once every week to ten days. Once training camp starts, we're gonna be hitting you weekly at the latest with new, fresh episodes of the podcast, so do not miss out. Rob Mahoney, he's our guy from Sports Illustrated and for the first time. Ever, he did single handedly the SI Top one hundred. We talk

about it right now, Rob mahoney. We have established over time that the SI Top one hundred is a very comprehensive and lengthy exercise. But do you ever get to a point where you're sick of talking about it or hearing about it, discussing it, debating it. There are certainly times in the process of making it or I'm a little tired of thinking about it. I mean, you go back and forth with the same players over and over.

There's kind of only so much deliberation you can do before your mind threatens to kind of ooze out your ears. So but I've had some time to recover from that. I'm fully prepared and ready to talk about it as much as you'd like. Because Goliver bailed on you this year, did you have to talk to yourself more like who did you have the internal debates with when you're trying

to sort the list down? Yeah? Yeah, without without Ben this year, the entire ranking process, in terms of you know, kind of final cut as it were, was on my shoulders. So it was a lot more arguing with myself and then still stink feedback from the rest of our staff

at Sports Illustrated too. They were really great in terms of, you know, checking biases, checking perceptions, bringing information on the table that you know, when you're thinking about this volume of players, there's inevitably some piece of information that slips through the cracks, and so making sure we're being as honest and consistent as possible in this ranking. It really

really wouldn't have been possible without them as well. How often would you get to point the list where you were surprised with where a player ended up or did you have a pretty general idea going into it of who would fall on what type of range. I think

it depends on the ranges. I mean, I think the top ten was more or less kind of what I thought it would be, and then things started getting a little strange from maybe fifteen to thirty or so, because I think this is a year in which a lot of the players who have been kind of established commodities in that range are starting to age out, or they're starting to get more injured or transitioned in a different stage of their career, and so there's a lot of

you know, whether it's younger guys, whether it's players who have you know, noticeable holes in their game or something to prove. Guys are kind of jumping into that grouping, and so I think that Eric had a little a

little more unpredictable than maybe in previous years. And of course later in the ranking too, there's there's obviously some spots where you know, whether it's kind of classic top one hundred favorites end up further down the list than you may think, or some new players who are kind of jumping into the list for the first time end up higher on the list than you might expect. This has become a most looked forward to a preseason right of passage the last couple of years for us here

at the podcast in seventy six ers Land. But as a refresher, if there's anyone new out there listening who has not heard our conversations the past couple of years, could you give us a refresher the rundown of how

you formulate your rankings and things you look at. Yeah, of course, I mean, so we're looking at solely the upcoming season, who are going to be the most valuable players within that parameter only, and within that we're trying to look at players in a vacuum, So we don't want to hold it against somebody if they play for a bad team. We don't want to boost somebody just because they play for a playoff team or a championship

caliber team. We're looking at conceptually, what does it mean to have LaMarcus Aldridge or Jimmy Butler or Lebron James on your team? What does that do for you from a team building standpoint? What does that open up for your team? What does it take away? And so we're

trying to account for health. You know, if a player has an established injury, we're trying to account for the fact that they're going to miss a month or two months or six months of the season, if they have an injury history, we're trying to kind of hedge in that regard. And also if they're a younger player or an older player, we're trying to kind of project a little bit in terms of where they might be by

the end of the season. So we're looking at the regular season, the playoffs both combined in terms of what could a player give you over the course of the upcoming year. Unfortunately, you could fill a portion of an all star roster with some guys who would probably project with him the top fifteen to the top ten. Was this year more than previous ones more tricky with the impact of injuries in creating the list. I think that's always the hardest part of our list. And oh, I

should have clarified as well. We don't include any rookies in our ranking as well, so you know, Zion Williams and not in the top one hundred, even though you may think of him as a top one hundred player. But as far as the injury piece goes, I mean Kevin Durant is the hardest one because he's expected to miss the entirety of the season with his achilles injury. And I think I was, you know, kind of in the mind for him going into this before his injury.

You know, over the course of the season, I'm constantly making notes about where guys might be adjusted or you know, how to consider some guys in the ranking, and all of my notes pointed to Kevin duran being the number

one player in the league this season. And so for him to be out not only is obviously that devastating for him personally, and it's something he's gonna have to work through and get back, you know, into playing shape and playing form, and I'm eager to see him do that, but particularly tough given that, you know, Lebron James has had such a stranglehold on the top spot in our ranking for so long, and this really was Katie's first

best shot at taking that away. The seventy Sixers were in pretty rare company in having five players within the top seventy five of the list. You can correct me if I'm wrong. I think only one other team had

five guys inside the top seventy five. I tried to audit that as best I could, but before we zero in on the five particular players who cracked that portion of the list, what are your general thoughts, Robin, where the seventy Sixers are as they head into a season with lots of expectations amidst the change landscape, especially in the Eastern Conference. I mean, I personally find the Sixers always to be a really fascinating team just by the nature of the personnel that they put on the floor.

And you know, this year, especially so with the you know edition about Horford, with you know, all the trades they made over the course of the last year, and you know, losing Jimmy Butler now, but giving to Bias a chance to really settle in and find his legs with the organization. What his new role is going to be in terms of, you know, where their talent matches

up with the league. I think we see something kind of consistent with the sixers teams passed in the sense that the top five itself is going to be very strong. The questions are going to be, you know, moving into the bench, moving deeper into the rotation, are they going to be able to get enough from those guys, because I think, you know, top five or top six in the rotation, they're really about as solid as VA teams come.

I'm going to bounce around a little bit and not go totally in sequential numerical order, either ascending or descending, but I will start with the highest rated seventy sixer on your list, Joel Embid number seven. He was number nine this time last year. When you're a top ten player on the top of one hundred, what does that generally say about you, especially given as you explained a few minutes ago, how you do the rankings looking at

players within a vacuum and somewhat within isolation. I mean, I think it depends on where you want to mark kind of the tiers of the league in terms of who is really in that elite class of player. I think, you know, Joel's maybe just outside of it. When you're talking about, you know, really the cream of the crowd being that top maybe five or so from Jannis and

Kauai and Lebron, Steph Curry and James Harden. Those guys are really in kind of a class by themselves, and that next group maybe six to ten, six to eleven or twelve, depending on how you want to define it. Those are the players who you know, may have a case to move up in the right circumstances, may be able to, you know, in Joel's case, to develop, you know, whether it's his game or you know, getting an even better condition, showing that he can stay healthy for you know,

even longer stretches of time. So we can kind of put some of that stuff to rest, have a case to move up into that group and are really kind of knocking on the door of it. And so I think that's a really exciting place to be. I think by being in the top ten, you're kind of saying about a player this could be you know, the best player on a championship level team or at least a high level contending team, and that's, you know, exactly where

the Sixers want to be. Obviously, taking a look at his three seasons worth of work in the NBA, where would you say at this point Joel is impacting the game the most when he's on the floor. It's a it's a tough question, just because you know, with him, even more so than other players in the top ten, you're talking about a guy who could be the defensive player of the year on pretty much an annual basis, and also just has the capacity to absorb so much

offensive attention. I think his offense as a whole could use even a little bit more improvement if he could stand to be a little bit more efficient. The jumper is obviously still a work in progress, and shot selection kind of tied into that in terms of when to take those threes, when to take the long face up twos. You know, obviously he's still kind of trying to curtail his turnovers, which, as I noted in writing about him,

is really kind of a product of his ambition. You know, Joel is a guy who will try all kinds of moves that makes him such an exciting player to watch and such a difficult one to defend. But in some cases, you know, he lets his foot work get away from him, or he picks up, you know, his pivot and commits

to a move before it's really there. So if he can bring down on those turnovers and some of those aspects of this game, clean up a couple of the mistakes, we're talking about what could be one of the most impactful offensive players in the game, just because not only is he incredibly productive as a score as we saw last season, but he's a guy who just demands a

lot of your attention. From a game planning perspective, if Joel is on the floor, he all but demands a certain level of big in order to come back him, a certain level of strength and size that opponents have to commit to, which takes them further and further away from, you know, if they want to play small ball, if they want to play whatever their best lineups are, now all of a sudden they have to tweak their rotation

to deal with him specifically. And so I think he's a very difficult guy to stay in terms of which side is you know, his bigger asset at this point, the bigger, bigger contribution to the game, just because he does have that that incredible balance. Thinking back to this time last year, I think my excitement for the seventy six or season was based upon that. The previous year. Talking about twenty seventeen, twenty eighteen, they finally broke through.

They got to the playoffs, made a great run of the second round. They were limited by the Celtics. They took a lot of the same core going into eighteen nineteen. They reached the seventh game of the second round. Obviously they lost the Raptors. But this year the team's going to look different. There's more veterans on the bench. Obviously

the projected starting five could look different. And that's where I want to move to the next guy who I'm gonna bring up with you, Al Horford, who is number eighteen on your list this year, expected to see a lot of time alongside Joel Embiid. Al Horford at this stage of his career, where do you see him at? I think he's still a pretty incredible player. And some of it, you know, in making the top one hundred, we're looking at, as I mentioned, kind of the flexibility

and the malleability of these particular talents. And so in Horford, you have not only one of the best centers in the league, but a center who you can now transpose to the sixers and him be one of the best power forwards in the league. And then you move into that backup center spot, you know, conceivably behind Joel and really help stop that gap there, which is always a problem when you're talking about how do you replace the

minutes when you're superstar isn't on the floor. Horford, I think, is a guy who he makes your defense kind of holistically better, great communicator, great in rotation, really preemptive, and you know, for the Philadelphia in particular, a team that already defends at a really high level already has so many varied, inversatile pieces to move around the board to help control matchups. I think Horford is just an incredible

piece to have in that equation. And so you have that, and then as well, you have a great playmaking big, a guy who can stretch the floor but also who can take some bigs off the dribble, as we've seen him do against Joel for example, in previous playoffs. So you know, Horford is a guy who I think is tricky for fans who are looking for a very particular

kind of dominance. If you're looking for a guy who's going to you know, powerpost like Joel does, who's going to fill up the box score like some other bigs do, who's going to be just demonstratively dominant on every possession,

he's not that guy. But he's the kind of player who when you watch him as a member of your team over the course of a season, you start to notice and all these little accumulations of these things he's contributing to the game, not to mention the fact that he's just a beloved teammate around the league, a guy that you know, players respect and listened to a lot, which I think, as we talked about for the Sixers,

could go a long way as well. How curious are you to see how Horford and Joel are used on the defense end of the floor. We saw times last year in the postseason. Think of when Joel covered Pascal Siakam, he was more up against a four. Obviously, Al Horford can take on both positions as well. What do you envision happening there is as far as how they split

reps between those two spots. I think it's really fun because when you're talking about playoff matchups in particular, you know, you're really getting into the micro level detail of an opponent, is you know, singling out almost a very specific kind of pick and roll matchup for example, to attack, you know, whether they want to go at Joel or away from

Joel or whatever it is. And so having you know, two bigs who are really you know, all League caliper defenders, it really leaves you no quarter, you know, as an opponent in terms of who you're going to go at, who you're going to engage, which then forces you into all kinds of other action. Then you're really kind of dwelling on the perimeter a little bit more. You're getting out of your comfort zone as a team when you take away you know, even basic pick and roll stuff.

And so, you know, I like that flexibility in terms of if you have a guy like Siakam or you know, someone who really is oriented towards attacking the basket, then you could put Joel in front of them and really use his link to that kind of great advantage. And if you're looking to defend in space as the Sixers.

Now you have Forford, who really does that about as well as anyone in the league in terms of reading those situations and understanding kind of where to take the step, how to cut off the angle, all these things that kind of go into the microprocessing of managing a possession at the NBA level, and so there really aren't many

teams that have that flexibility. I'm sure there will be tradeoffs to playing as big as the Sixers do, but defensively, in terms of managing those kinds of matchups and those kinds of situations, I think they're in a really unique and powerful position. Were you surprised that he signed with the Sixers? Very just because I didn't know. You know, with al there's always the question of do you want to be playing center? You know? And how much is

that important to him? Because in some ways I think it is probably his best position, just because you can leverage the unique things that he does more effectively. There but the idea that, for one, I didn't know how the Sixers were going to make the math work. There's already the question of you know, Jimmy and Tobias, you know,

what are they going to offer these guys? Are they going to be able to bring them both back then obviously with the situation with Jimmy and moving on from that and being able to flip effectively him into both al and also bringing in Josh Richardson as well. I mean, that's a very delicate line to walk from a salary cap standpoint that I honestly just didn't know that they

had the room for. I was in the camp that figured that, you know, Horford would end up kind of resigning with the Celtics, maybe just on a one year deal or opting in for you know, for his contract, but I kind of figured he would end up staying there. So to see him in Philadelphia is a nice surprise, just from the perspective of seeing new and fun things

in the league. A domino that definitely dropped in terms of that whole equation was Jimmy Butler ending up with the Miami Heat Josh Richardson coming to the seventy sixers in the sign and trade. He was number seventy one going into last season, on the top one hundred, number seventy one again this year. Defensively, he's got a lot of things to be excited about. Offensively, it seems like he can do a couple different things, play at two

different spots. So versatility is that one of the more prominent themes that stands out to you, Robin when talking about Josh Richardson. I think so. And that's really a credit to the work he and the Miami Heats developmental staff have done over the last two years in particular where they really needed a lot of ball handling help. And so part of that experiment was, you know, with both him and Justice Winslow, kind of stretching out how much those guys can contribute from a ball handling and

creative perspective. And so we saw, you know, Josh Richardson do a lot more coming off of curls into a pick and roll kind of similar actions in a way to I think what Sixers fans would be familiar with what JJ Redick has done and some of the same implementations.

He's not the same shooter, but he's a guy who maybe is even more comfortable in terms of putting the ball on the floor and making that next move, whether it's a pass to the corner, whether it's pulling up for a mid range jumper, whether it's going all the way to the basket. I think he has a little bit more flexibility to that part of his game. So when you're talking about his offense, obviously he's going to

be a spot up option in certain scenarios. You know, you have a postal player like Joel Empide, you want to make sure that the floor is spread. But with Josh Richardson, I think he gives you some variability in terms of how possessions unfold from beginning to end, a little bit more unpredictability in kind of navigating a defense

and what they're throwing at you. And then defensively, as you mentioned, I think it's just a great pressure defender can really get up and into people in a way that makes a lot of sense, combining with kind of the catch all defensive guys like Embid and Horford. Where do you see his ceiling being at. I don't know

that he has a big step left to take. I think he's kind of where in the general range of where he's going to be, just because unless there's some just dramatic change in terms of the burst off the first step or his jumper, those are kind of the two areas where you would you would look for him to improve because He's already a guy who is kind of maxing out from an effort standpoint, He's really dialed into every possession he's on the floor. He's already a

very good defensive player. You know, a guy that I've voted for All NBA Second Team in the past, and it is kind of in that group with all those great perimeter defenders. And so then it's question of where does this guy take a step And it's kind of the hardest area in a sense in terms of being more efficient as a creator, being more efficient while putting

up more volume. You know, that's a big hurdle to jump as a wing guy in the NBA, And it really is what separates guys like Josh Richardson from that next class of player, whether you know, maybe a class where you might consider to bias to be in that group or even higher in terms of guys who can really create a bit more for themselves without a lot

of help. Where Josh, I think, is kind of been a range where he needs a little bit more screening action, a little bit more offball stuff, just to free him up a little bit more because off the dribble, he's not necessarily you know, he doesn't have the most shake

to his game, I'll put it that way. So along those lines, is it simply plug him into the system the seventy Sixers had been running the last two years since they got the full compliment of their core and started to go on these postseason runs, or do you envisioned things being tweaked a little bit? Perhaps? I think they'll have to be tweaked, just because the threat of Josh Richardson's shot is not the same as the threat

of JJ Reddick shot. And you know, those handoffs between him and Ebide, for example, were just such an important part of what the Sixers were running pretty much all

the time. So when you have the calculus of that changed, and then of course you're bringing in a very new and different piece and a guy like Horford, I think it not only kind of opens up the playbook in a sense because you have another playmaking big on the floor or another connector who can get you kind of from one side to the other, from one action to the next, but you're also gonna have to deal with some of the things you're giving up, whether that's JJ shooting,

whether that's what Jimmy was giving you, you know, as an isolation and as a pick role player, there are some things to offset here, and so I think the Sixers are you know, they're They're always kind of one of the more unique offenses in the league in terms of how they run, and I think they're in a position to kind of take some some even more some some even more unique steps in different steps going forward, just in terms of no no team has personnel like this,

and that, you know, really opens up the door for a lot of creativity, for a lot of ingenuity on the part of Brett Brown and his staff, which is a big part of the reason why I'm eager to see how this works. That segues nicely into the themes surrounding Tobias Harris for this year, who before even getting into his role with the Sixers this season, and how it might be different from what we saw last year.

For a guy to jump, I'm gonna do quick math because I'm terrible at It's sixteen spots on your list. Tobias Harris was sixty five going into last year and he's now number forty nine going into this season. Is that a pretty substantial jump. It's definitely a substantial jump, and I think you could even argue within that jump that you know, with the sorts in particular, I think Tobias was asked to give up a lot of what he does well, especially in terms of running kind of

both sides of the pick and roll game. Really great complete pick and roll player, whether he's initiating and or screening. And the Sixers just don't run a lot of pick and roll in a traditional sense, and so Tobias was so often kind of a guy on the week side of the floor, balancing things. He was involved in different capacities.

But I think certainly a player who could do more in a post Jimmy Butler era, and as you know, the Sixers look to get even more, to get even weirder in a sense of the stuff that they're willing to run. I think he could be the beneficiary of

that a lot. But just you know, top to bottom, even with all of that understood, just a very impressive season from Tobias in terms of his three point shooting, you know, his complete scoring game, and also kind of finding his way a little bit as a team defender. I think he still has some room to grow in that regard and settle in to really be a you know, an even more solid team guy on that side of the ball. But I think he has a chance to be to be pretty reliable from what you've observed, from

you've heard from other people. What do you things allowed him to continue to develop his game, It seems like in a pretty linear fashion over the course of his career in the league. I think some of it is just that he's been given such different opportunities even from

year to year. He's been on a lot of, you know, very differently shaped teams and of course bouncing around through a lot of different franchises, and I think, you know, it's curious kind of the way that no team has really been able to commit to him until now in terms of your guy we really want to feature within our team that we want to build around, that we want to cultivate even more. But that has put a lot of pressure on him to really take steps every year.

There's never really been a position where he could be comfortable. And so some guys, I think, whither in that kind of environment and they fall out of the league or they followed the rotation, and Tobias has really kind of taken the opposite tact where I think it's encouraged him to add little things to his game, to you to

tweak his game even a little bit. Not to mention the fact that I think that you know, the the you know, the tenor of the modern game suits him very well in terms of of a big who can put the ball on the floor, or wing however you want to classify him, but a bigger wing certainly put the ball on the floor, create for himself a little bit, makes them plays, has a nice kind of in between game that can work through the seams of a defense.

I think that's kind of exactly what teams need right now, because you know, India defenses, professional defenses are so sophisticated. You really need guys who can kind of find their way, and Tobias is so good at that and really has developed that part of his game in particular, you know, since leaving you know, the Orlando Magic or so over the last couple of years. We'll wrap things up with number twenty three on the list. Up three spots from this time of year ago. That would be Ben Simmons.

What growth areas did you see from Ben in your number two in the NBA? Well, I mean, obviously there's the question moving forward of you know, his shot and how that plays into, you know, the future of his game. But in terms of the rest of it, I think

there's there's just so much to like. You know, you're talking about a player who's you know, probably the most versatile point guard defender in the league in terms of a guy who you can throw just at normal point guards and live with that matchup on most nights, He's not going to get beat by most opponents. He's so big, he can take away a lot of things in terms of driving angles and shooting angles that other guards rely on.

Great rebrounder obviously for his position, really really interesting and creative playmaker in terms of the things that he sees and finds on the floor, and a pace Accelleran, a guy who's going to get you easy you know, a lot more easy shots just by being on the floor, because when he gets that board, he's going to go.

And so when you have already that kind of foundation, already a pretty well versus well balanced game, who can work some dribble handoffs, who can do, you know, just like to buy us both sides of a pick and roll game if he needs to, Who can be more of a facilitator and a connector. I think he's such an interesting player from a team building standpoint because he

allows you to go in so many different directions. Whether that means you want to play him as a kind of traditional buy the book point guard, whether that means you want to work him into a different kind of role depending on your lineup. He just allows you to

experiment with so much. And I think that's kind of the strength of Ben's game is the idea, if you have a Jimmy Butler on your team, or to Bias Harris on your team, we're now at all Horford on your team, that you can lean into those players' strengths and still find things for Ben to do that are

really effective and really important on the floor. A lot of the talk around here after the playoffs last year was the job that Ben did, specifically on the defensive end of the floor in the opening round series against the Brooklyn Nets and Angel Russell, and then doing as much as he could against Kawhi Leonard for the bulk of the Toronto series. Did you like what you saw out of him defensively? Did he show you something a

little bit more? I think a little bit more, But he was already a pretty impressive defender to begin with. I think he was already working from a pretty high bar, high bar, excuse me, And so there were some added challenges in terms of the you know, the personnel that you're describing, really kind of handling those matchups is a different level of scrutiny, requires a different level of attention

than what he's been asked to do previously. But he's always been very impressive and dependable already on that end.

As I mentioned, just in terms of the versatility of that, the idea that your point guard could be the guy you throw at Kawhi Leonard, Andy Angelo Russell, there just aren't many players who can handle, you know, that breadth of assignment, and so that that piece of it is very impressive and certainly allows the Sixers to do a lot of interesting things with how they juggle their matchups.

As you put a bow on all this zooming back up to around thirty thousand feet, it sounds like for a team that's been pretty steady defensively the last couple of years, would you think the Sixers have a chance to take their team collective defense to another level this year? I think so. I mean just you know, even in you know, having Jimmy Butler for part of the season, and Jimmy is you know, really an impressive on ball

defender in particular. But when you're looking at how do you replace a player like that or move on from a player like that, you know, Josh Richardson is certainly a great start in terms of replicating a lot of what he's doing what Jimmy was doing defensively and maybe you can even be more dedicated on that because he

won't be called to do so much offensively. And then Al Horford just in terms of kind of your your defensive brain trust, having another guy who's thinking the game at that level on the floor and helping to run things can only be a boon for your defense. So you know, you have the standout defensive talents in both Joel and Bid and Ben Simmons, two young players who you know really could only take another step defensively as

they keep maturing and keep growing. You have, you know, this defensive type captain in terms of All Horford and a new guy in Josh Richardson and Tobias who you know, at the very least as a big body and a guy who can move around to a lot of different matchups. There's there's again, just so much to work with there. And I think that's the consistent theme with the Sixers and what makes them, you know, in some ways difficult because this is not a buy the book team, this

is not a traditional team. There when you have all these options on the table, it can be a little bit exhausting, I imagine to try to find, you know, the best avenue to deploy all of these different weapons. But that's exactly the kind of problem of coaching staff wants to have, wellne with this. The third week of May has been the crossroads point for the seventy sixers in two eighteen and twenty nineteen, where they run in

the postseason has come to an end. Do you think there'll be more seventy six of stuff on the court to talk about beyond that date come May twenty twenty,

I definitely do. I mean, I think that this is a team that just has an incredible amount of potential in terms of the upward mobility, and some of that is Joel you know where you know, as we're talking about the top ten guys, the top fifteen guys in the league's he's one of the few players who I think in the near term future, whether that's the next two or three years or so, you could really be talking about him as is he you know, in the conversation of is he the best player in the league?

Does he's that kind of a growth arc that he could take to his game. He has that kind of foundation already, and so when you're working from from that place to begin with and adding all of this, you know, this talent and repositioning this talent in an Eastern conference that I think, other than the Bucks, doesn't have a lot of teams that I think are credible challengers to the six She's in it. From a talent standpoint, I think this is a really great opportunity for them this year.

There's gonna be a lot to figure out, but there's there's really a nice window here for them to do something important. Awesome, great stuff is always Rob Mahoney, the man from Sports Illustrated. Thanks so much, as always for the time and excellent to get the wisdom and insights.

Of course, thanks Rattingie. Before we part ways on this episode of the podcast, I want to leave you with a piece of sound from Brett Brown's annual media lunching with reporters that was held this past week on Wednesday, September twenty fifth in Center City. He talks about what to expect from the seventy sixers in this season ahead, and I thought that by playing it into this episode that could whet the appetite for some of the storylines we're gonna get to see coming out of training camp

starting next week. So here's Bretton at his media lunching. I know we're going to play defense. That still is real my day. It's where my head is scented as our starting point. You git me talk about Philly edge hard and real. It's true in the city. You know what I'm gonna say. And so I feel comfortable that we're going to defend because we can, and it's how I see the world. I think that we're going to score because we have options. I believe we have a

championship Calibertina. It is just about upon us training camp and the preseason. We're going to dig into it that much more next time on the broadcast to see it