January 13, 2016
On Wednesday afternoon at PCOM, Sam Hinkie was asked if his job has been any different since Jerry Colangelo was brought on as chairman of basketball operations of the Philadelphia 76ers.
(Besides the welcome change of talking on the record after a random January practice, that is.)
“It’s been pretty similar,” Hinkie said. “One more person to be able to reach out to and ping things off of, but otherwise it’s been pretty similar.”
We’re over a month into the new front office dynamic, and Colangelo is currently in town until Friday on what he described as “Sixer business.” Last night, Colangelo met with ownership (specifically Josh Harris and David Blitzer) in New York. And today, he sat down with Hinkie at practice.
So far, they are presenting a united front. Similar to Hinkie, Colangelo downplayed the idea of a major shake-up or sweeping changes. The longtime executive maintained that his first month has mostly been about trying to get acclimated to his new situation.
“I’ve learned a lot in just a few weeks, for sure,” Colangelo said. “I think we’ve done some tweaking. If you recall, at the [opening] press conference I said there may be some things that you could do of an immediate nature that could be helpful and beneficial. But as far as the plan, whatever people think the plan is, nothing is changing as far as a course.”
Ah, those tweaks. The moves in question (Mike D’Antoni, Ish Smith, and Elton Brand) had Colangelo’s fingerprints all over them, but both at the opening press conference and now five weeks later, he has held that The Process will live on.
While those tweaks could be simply viewed as short-term moves, it was notable how “anti-Hinkie” they seemed on the surface. In particular, Smith was a player that the Sixers had under contract just last season. For better or worse, dealing two second-round picks from a position of weakness for what essentially amounts to a quick fix isn’t how the Sixers have operated since May 2013 when Hinkie was hired.
When asked if not re-signing Smith in the offseason was a mistake, Hinkie expressed that he is willing to change his mind when he receives new information.
“That’s part of it,” Hinkie said. “We won’t bat a thousand, I’m not surprised by that at all. So the opportunity to go back and get someone that we could be highly confident would fit into our system and play the style we want to play and back to what I said earlier, get our best players the ball, that’s important.”
Hinkie said that he has flown out to Phoenix “a good bit” to meet with Colangelo and talk about the Sixers for hours at a time. Colangelo, who still resides in Arizona, says that he is picking his spots to be around the team but is on the phone conducting “Sixer business” every day.
So, how is the back-and-forth between the 38-year-old Hinkie and 76-year-old Colangelo?
“I think he would say our temperaments are a little different, but if you’ve been in the league for five decades like he has, he’s got a long-term view too,” Hinkie said.
From here, it’s essential that Colangelo and Hinkie stay on the same page. The major benefit that the Sixers have enjoyed over the last few years while acquiring all of those assets is that every level of the organization (ownership, front office, coaching staff, players) has generally bought into the same plan.
Colangelo, who said that his role is to “make recommendations” about what the Sixers can do to get better, at least publicly seems on board with what Hinkie has built.
“The reality is, and I’ve come to understand this, that Sam has really done a great job of accumulating assets,” Colangelo said. “If you look at the trades, you look at the draft picks that have been accumulated, it’s all there in place. Now it’s a matter of when do you pull the trigger on using all those assets, or any of the assets?”
Actions speak louder than words. When and how the Sixers use their assets will ultimately say much more than Hinkie or Colangelo currently can, but hey, this wasn’t half-bad for a random Wednesday in January.
Follow Rich on Twitter: @rich_hofmann
