OK, I'll start: I believed the Sixers were gonna escape the Wells Fargo Center with a win last night.
LOL what team have you been watching the last four seasons? Yeah, yeah. Not wrong, but c'mon: They were up seven with the ball and under 90 seconds to go. They had Joel Embiid, Robert Covington, J.J. Redick, Ben Simmons and [coughs while talking to make name audible] on the court, and Philadelphia's greatest superhero since Oates ready in reserve to jump in and save the day at a moment's notice. They won a game already. Process to progress, right? Right?
Well, looks like the more things change, the more things actually maybe didn't really change that much hahahahaha you actually thought things had really changed? The Sixers went scoreless for their final five possessions, the Rockets cobbled together a layup, a goaltend, a free-throw and a buzzer-beating triple, and a stunned WFC crowd is probably still struggling to find the energy to walk to their cars. 105-104 Rockets, 1-4 Sixers, why why why why why.
So instead of the things we should be talking about this morning — i.e., T.J. McConnell is Eric Clapton, Joel Embiid is new Dirk as well as new Hakeem, life with wings who can shoot is like getting broadband after a decade of dial-up — we're swapping the same predictable homilies about Needing to Learn How to Win and Not Blaming Brett Brown for Everything. Could be worse, and significantly less predictable: We could be talking about how Markelle Fultz has an excess of (and/or desperate need for) fluid in his right shoulder, and how he may miss "the next three games" (Sixerspeak for sometime between a month and forever) while we figure out which it is. We'll get back to that one soon enough, surely.
I mean, whatever. Yes T.J. should have been in that game on the last defensive possession, yes it's dumb that they called that goaltend on Embiid, yes Jerryd Bayless made at least three plays terrible enough to merit a moral loss on their own, yes it's weird that the Sixers seem to have a gravitational pull towards late-game offensive collapse, yes this entire situation with Fultz feels like the Sixers actively inventing an early-season crisis because none befell them naturally. BUT: Joel Embiid, Ben Simmons, Robert Covington, J.J. Redick and T.J. McConnell. I will not blame myself for daring to believe that things will soon be good, because they soon will be. They have to be.
In the meantime, Dallas in Dallas on Saturday. Don't be too mean with that mid-range, JoJo.