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Philadelphia 76ers Have to Deal With the Reality of Just One Top Pick This Season

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Jakarr Sampson, Philadelphia 76ers,

Mike DiNovo-USA TODAY Sports

This was not the way Sam Hinkie’s grand plan was supposed to work.

With the end of the NBA season at hand, the Philadelphia 76ers general manager is looking at likely one top pick, instead of the four he had planned on after the early-season trade of Michael Carter-Williams. That pick is the Sixers’ own, which could be a No. 1, but likely no worse than a No. 4.

The only good news for the Sixers is that they got more ping-pong balls on Saturday night, thanks to their 114-107 loss at the Chicago Bulls. They had only nine players healthy and no true point guards, and, while they played hard, the outcome was inevitable. Still, they are looking at only one pick in the first round of the upcoming draft.

All of this means that the tanking, which was supposed to come to an end with this year’s draft, will continue at least one more year. Sure, Joel Embiid will join Nerlens Noel to form an imposing back line of the defense, but to get the players the Sixers needed to compete right away, they needed three or four first-round picks, not the one they will have to settle for now.

When Hinkie made the Carter-Williams trade, it appeared very realistic that the Los Angeles Lakers would finish no worse than sixth, giving the Sixers their top-five protected pick. Then the Lakers went into a second-half nosedive and are locked into the fourth-worst record. Now, the Sixers will have to wait until next year for that pick.

The Sixers also own the Miami Heat’s top-10 protected pick and, at one time, that looked solidly in their pocket. Now, it does not due to the Heat being effectively out of the playoff race — a game behind the Boston Celtics and Brooklyn Nets. If, by some minor miracle, the Heat get into the playoffs, the Sixers get their pick, but that’s not a realistic hope now.

The Sixers also own the Oklahoma City Thunder’s top-18 protected pick and, if the Thunder do not make the playoffs, the Sixers will not get that pick, but it gets more complicated in that the Thunder can make the playoffs and still not forfeit the pick to the Sixers because they have to finish better than four Eastern Conference teams to lose that pick, so Sixers fans have little to no hope there, too.

What does this all mean? The tanking that was supposed to end with the upcoming draft will last for another season. For Sixers fans, the waiting, again, will be the hardest part.

Mike Gibson is a writer for www.RantSports.com. Follow him on Twitter @papreps , “Like” him on Facebook or add him to your network on Google.

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