This Proves the Sixers are ALL-IN…

This Proves the Sixers are ALL-IN…

free agent signings and trades around the NBA are all anyone is talking about. But we have basketball on the horizon with the summer league right around the corner and a Sixers roster to look at. But while there will be some familiar faces on this roster, I think the bigger story is the guy who is not on this summer league roster, that being Jared McCain. I want to speak about what this means to the Sixers belief in McCain, why I think this is a bit odd overall and how my handling of the situation would be and overall dive into what our expectations should be McCain for McCain coming into the season. Now to dive into this fully, do want to start off with just the summer league roster as a whole here that you can see some names that we know do know. Jaylen Hood Shafino obviously stuck around in that brutal season last year. Jaylen Slawson, Justin Edwards, who I do think there are some really high hopes for and I’m happy that he is continuing to compete in this. Janai Broom obviously the second round pick, the guy who there is some promise for and a clear pathway to him earning an opportunity for minutes on this real Sixers team if he performs at a high level. Eison alamama there who our guy Ryan Cole dove into deeper on each of these names. You can refer to that video here but did just want to highlight these. Kev Kev Aluma who’s a guy I quite like out of Virginia Tech performed very well in summer league last year. Adona obviously coming into year two and expectations are high there once again the minutes are for the taking if he can earn it there. Judah Mintz another dude who I kind of like coming out of Syracuse originally there has bounced around a little bit and impressed. Jack Clark a local product there a guy that our very own Rahen Coyle has competed against on the basketball floor. St. Thomas, an intriguing name. Hunter Salis, guy that I also like quite a bit, coming out of Wake Forest on a two-way contract and I do think has a there’s a place for him in the NBA. I’ll leave it as that. Andrew Funk, another local product and a guy who’s uh pretty cool story here. A very nice guy. I’ve interviewed him a couple times and will be rooting for there. Mark Armstrong, Alex Ree, and VJ Edgecom lining out the roster here. Now, again, the biggest story to me is the fact that Jared McCain is not on the Sixers roster for summer league. Now, this is sort of an abnormality. Typically rookies and secondyear players for the organization do play in summer league. That that is kind of the expectation. And even in this case, you can see a Dembona on the roster. A guy like Justin Edwards who carved out a significant NBA role for himself who earned himself a payday this summer still competing there. But why is Jared McCain not? Now I first want to squash the worst Pierce that I don’t think this is an issue with any meniscus injuries lingering. We can refer back to this was December 14th when we got the news that Jared McCain did suffer that torn meniscus. very disappointing that that ended a premature season. But when talking about McCain specifically, how much should we temper expectations? It is hard not to go crazy. And when you dive into the numbers, it makes it easy to get fired up. And we’re talking about in his 23 games that he played last year, averaged 15.3 points, 2.4 rebounds, 2.6 assists, shot 46% from the field, 38.3% from three. and my eyes were not deceiving me that the offball movement, the instincts this guy had, how quick and repeatable his jump shot form is are all things that popped off the page in that brief sample size there. But why is he not competing in summer league? Is this a guy that the Sixers are viewing in such high regard that he is quote unquote too good for summer league? That may very well be the case here. Now, my personal take here and my expectation for what I thought was going to happen or how I would have handled this situation is I would have put McCain in summer league, have him play two to three games and then stamp him with the he’s too good, get him out of there. We saw Tyrese Maxi go through the same exact process. I believe it was in year three for Tyrese Maxi that he was at the summer league play the first couple games and was like, “Okay, you are way too good for these guys.” I also think there’s the other side that maybe this is the Sixers being a bit careful with Jared from the standpoint of in all fairness, Jared McCain did not pop in last year’s summer league. And it is a different skill set, a different style of basketball that the NBA is a polished product. We have plays being run. We have guys all on the same page that there is this connectivity between the roster and this it is cleaned up basketball. Summer league pretty far from it. That this is highle pickup hoops is essentially how the game is played there. And for McCain specifically, that’s probably not where he shines the best. that I do think his skill set is a player that is at his best when he’s being optimized coming off pin downs, coming off screens, running plays to generate shots for him and that is where he saw his success with this Sixers team. Now, a couple other McCain points that I did want to hit on. For starters, it’s awesome that he’s still in the arena. He’s still attending. He’s still at Sixers facil facilities while they’re practicing here. We can see him shooting around a little bit, which I think is an encouraging sign. And frankly, I just think it is good vibes that he’s around this roster. For a team that has plenty of guys that have, I guess, their checkered colors there or, you know, not the best overall demeanor about them, we would say Jared McCain is the opposite of all that. That this dude is a ray of sunshine everywhere he goes. And I think just having him around this roster is a good thing here. Now, a couple other points. We do see the youth movement that has begun to come down with the Sixers team that VJ Edgecom 19 years old, Jared McCain 21, Justin Edwards 21, Janai Broom 22, Adona 22 years old, Ricky Council still kicking around at 23 years old there. Tyrese Maxi just 24 and Quinton Grimes 25 with a full expectation that he will be back with the Sixers. We’ve started to see this youth movement. And where does McCain exactly fit in that pecking order? The fact that he’s not in summer league, I think is the first sign I’ve seen from the Sixers organization of they do view him in very high light. And again, the biggest factor that I do want to note here is it was a small sample size that he played 23 games last year. Now, if we want to get fired up about this small sample size, shout out to I don’t get ball on Twitter, who is a good Twitter follow there. And he said just randomly crunching numbers, but man, Jad McCain had a three-game stretch where he averaged 27.7 points per game, 6.0 0 assists, 1.3 steals, 2.3 rebounds per game. Shot 50 46 100 splits, 66% true shooting percentage, 63% effective field goal percentage, 10.7 three-point attempts per game. That is ridiculous stuff there. Now, we can’t lose our minds over threeame sample size cuz guys get hot all the time. You can skew yourself and view it a limited three-game sample size for just about any player and start to talk yourself into it. But I really feel my eyes do not did not deceive me for how Jared McCain can be, how good that he can be at the NBA level. The other key part of this that I did think was notable was this quote coming out from VJ Edgecom that he was asked about his priorities for summer league and he said quote being more of a point guard. Now this is surprising for me. I do think VJ overall it would be most beneficial to the Sixers for him to be more of that forward that shooting guard/s small forward type rather than that shooting guard/pointguard type. if we want to be honest about the Sixers roster that I think both Jared McCain and Tyrese Maxi are closer to that shooting guard/pointguard mold and I think Edgecomb he is bigger, he is more athletic and he is a guy that I think will be capable of scaling up. Now, with that said, I think this is a developmental move that VJ the biggest concern that there is with him and I think this can be overstated for stretches, but it’s the handle there that his handle is not quite NBA ready. And that’s the number one thing that’s going to be limiting to him for hit for hitting his ceiling there. That if EJ Edge picks up a legitimate handle where he can take guys off the dribble and to preface this, the tape with the Bahamas national team looks far better from a dribbling perspective from him being capable of attacking a close off close out, taking guys off the dribble, getting to the rim there. But for this guy who does all these high-flying dunks, who can outjump just about anybody at the rim there, you got to get to that spot for that to be effective. And I do wonder if the six are going to throw everything on his plate as sort of a a method to speed up his developmental process. It’s a different game when there’s multiple bodies being thrown at you at the NBA level. And you better believe every team in the summer league, every prospect that is hungry to earn himself a role is well aware that this guy is the third overall pick. Now, the NBA has done a nice job given us some pretty intriguing matchups. We get Ace Bailey right off the bat on Saturday night that I cannot wait to see if that matchup assuming Ace Bailey is even playing for the Utah Jazz at this point. They could theoretically see Cooper Flag if he is still sticking around. We can we’re going to see VJ Edgecom get a chance to match up with the top picks in this draft. Dylan Harper as well, Coniple that there will be a match up against the Hornets. There’s going to be some exciting basketball with this. But I do think that maybe this is more of a they want to see exactly what they got with VJ Edgecom and they’re confident in what they have with Jared McCain. So, it is a bit shocking to me that he’s not on the Sixers roster, but I think we should take this as this is genuine belief from the organization. They think this guy right now, right here, is too good to be playing in summer league, and that should be taken as a positive. I hope the rehab process is going great for Jared. And obviously, once again, as I did want to refer to this here, that he was on the court, he was doing some workouts. We can see that he’s at least physically moving around shooting a basketball and healthy there. I know he’s been pretty open about his recovery process and is very clearly through the worst of it there. a meniscus injury, particularly at his age and the surgery that he had done, is not something that we should have some significant concerns for issues popping up in the future. It does happen. It’s a bummer. It ruined what would have been a rookie of the year season, but hopefully that is hunger for the bounceback in season two. And the Sixers very clearly to me seemed ready to give him the reigns and see what he can do. So, it’s going to be interesting to see how this guard mix fits together. But, I’m pretty shocked that Jared McCain is not a part of the Sixers roster. And I’m going to choose to take this as a positive from a legitimate belief in the organization that he is too good to be there. We will see if that is the case and if that his level of play backs it up once the real season comes around. But very interesting that I do think is worth noting that Jared McCain will not be participating in summer league this year. But let me know what you guys think about all that in the comments. Do you think I’m crazy? Do you think this should be a concern? Because once again, I am viewing this in positive light that I do believe that is a good sign from a belief perspective from the Sixers that they’re not forcing McCain to suit up, go out and play in Las Vegas and play in the summer league. And honestly, my expectation is he’s still probably there hanging out. Uh we’ll see if he’s ultimately like I I mean, he’s obviously not on the roster, so he’s not playing, but I think we’ll still see plenty of Jared McCain this summer, and we’ll see what ultimately happens from here. But some interesting decisions being made by the Six organization across the boat here. Still more roster changes to be done. They still got to round out this roster. clean up the final couple spots here. But let me know what you guys think about all that from a summer league perspective. And we’re going to be tapping into that action on the channel once again. So make sure you guys are tapped in with us here at Sixers Digest. If you have not already, make sure you’re hitting that subscribe button, dropping a like on this video here. I’ll be back talking to you next time right here on Sixers Digest. Face.

This Proves the Sixers are ALL-IN…

The Sixers summer league roster has been announced and Jared McCain is not on the roster. Sean Barnard highlights what this could mean and what McCain’s role could look like for the Sixers this year.

#nba #sixers #philadelphia76ers

Sixers Digest is a YouTube Channel that covers all the latest news, trades, reports, and rumors regarding the Philadelphia 76ers. We provide comprehensive coverage on topics such as game highlights, player performances, and in-depth analysis of team strategies. Our channel features discussions on key players like Joel Embiid, Paul George, Tyrese Maxey, Jared McCain, and Kyle Lowry, as well as insights from Head Coach Nick Nurse and President of Basketball Operations Daryl Morey. Stay tuned for all the exciting updates and engaging content on everything Sixers!