Back in July, Sixers President of Basketball Operations Daryl Morey sat in a restaurant inside of the team's Las Vegas hotel and expressed significant excitement about the pair of players with three years of NBA experience the team had just inked to two-way contracts, Jabari Walker and Dominick Barlow.

"I think Jabari and Barlow, we were really excited to get. I think one thing to speak about learnings from last season was that when we had our key players out -- Joel [Embiid], primarily -- that really challenged our depth at the big spot," Morey said. "So we went into this offseason really prioritizing getting some really good young players, and our best tool to do that was the two-way. I do think us moving earlier on those two-ways was an advantage in that while the minimums around the league get squeezed in general in these systems, teams are carrying less players on their roster, and things like that. I think being able to get Jabari and Dominick, and say ‘Hey, we really think you’ll have a role even though it’s a two-way,’ I think that’s an edge and we were thrilled they chose to join us."

About five months later, those two players have been critical components of the Sixers' depth, which has withstood lengthy absences from Embiid, Paul George and Kelly Oubre Jr. among others to begin the 2025-26 season with a 13-9 record. Barlow has been particularly effective in a significant role despite missing nine games with an injury, while Walker is tied for second on the team in total appearances. The Sixers' two-way crop has returned tremendous value already.

"It's been great. Those two guys have filled that role really, really well," Sixers head coach Nick Nurse said before the Sixers beat the Golden State Warriors on Tuesday, as Barlow started and played 35-plus minutes, grabbing 13 rebounds and blocking three shots while Walker scored seven points and notched five rebounds in 12 minutes off the bench. "And they're similar in a way, but they are also a little different. The best thing about both of them is they play really hard, both of them. Just everything they do seems to come out of great effort... It's just a lot of effort plays, and we really, really need that."

In this week's Sunday stats, a particularly deep dive into the Sixers' successful two-way signings: 

653

The total number of minutes played by two-way players for the Sixers, highest among all NBA teams.

Back in July, Morey said the Sixers' lengthy track record of signing players to two-way deals and eventually watching them earn standard contracts – in Philadelphia or elsewhere – aided their pitches to prospective two-way signees.

"We’ve had a good history of guys coming in, showing what they can do, get converted and then either with us or other teams, go on to do really well in the league," Morey said. "So yeah, that’s an important piece for us when we’re pitching two-ways, is it’s part of a bigger picture that we think you can be a part of long-term."

Not every team is willing to give two-way players – limited to 50 games as an active player before a conversion to a standard contract is required to keep playing – unlimited rope to play. Barlow has only been active 13 times; he was inactive nine times because of injury. 10 of his 13 appearances has been starts. But Walker has been active for every single game this year and has played in all but one of them.

"It's a blessing, honestly, but I don't take it for granted," Walker said last month. "It just makes you more – wanting to prove yourself, to prove that you deserve to continue to get those minutes, because it can be taken in an instant... A lot of two-ways are not in that position."

Barlow and Walker are already among the most successful Sixers two-way signings since the hybrid NBA/G League contracts were implemented in 2017-18 (the top two, in some order: Shake Milton, Paul Reed, both of whom earned standard contracts with the Sixers and then eventually larger deals). Justin Edwards also represents competition for that title.

While the Sixers losing Guerschon Yabusele to the rival New York Knicks was deeply upsetting to many fans, Barlow and Walker have both outperformed Yabusele on two-way deals while the 29-year-old is on the books for $5.5 million this season with a player option worth just under $5.8 million for the 2026-27 season. Yabusele has played 10.1 minutes per game for New York and is shooting below 40 percent from the field.

Between Barlow and Walker on two-way signings, Trendon Watford on a veteran's minimum, Oubre's early-season minutes at the four being exceptional and George showing comfort sliding up there, the Sixers have suddenly gone from weak at power forward to quite deep.

344

Dominick Barlow's total minutes, highest among all two-way players in the NBA entering Saturday.

At this point, it is difficult to find a member of the Sixers who has not praised Barlow. Nurse signed him out as a standout after the team's very first official practice and it has been off to the races from there. Barlow started on opening night because Nurse coveted his offensive rebounding and blend of size, length and athleticism at power forward. He swung the game in the Sixers' favor:

The latest to give Barlow his flowers: Embiid, who has spent much of his career playing alongside stretch fours and wings rather than players like Barlow. He has welcomed this change.

"Love it. Love it," Embiid said. "...He's one of those guys, just has athletic ability, being able to rebound the ball, and doing the dirty work. You need that on a basketball team, and he's one of those guys. Fits in perfectly with his role. That's great. I'm excited. Just another athletic guy that you can just let him be himself and [he will] get the job done."

Barlow's offensive rebounding is his most obvious skill, but he has earned more and more trust as a defender, not just as a shot-blocker but also as a perimeter option against some of the league's better wings. With Oubre sidelined, Barlow's importance to the Sixers on defense has heightened quite a bit and he has taken on additional responsibilities in stride:

An added bonus of the Sixers bypassing Yabusele and then leaving their taxpayer's mid-level exception open: that can be used to sign Barlow and/or Walker to multi-year deals that do not just cement their places on this season's roster, but gets them under long-term control.

+45

The Sixers' point differential in 79 minutes with Dominick Barlow on the floor alongside Tyrese Maxey, VJ Edgecombe and Quentin Grimes.

Barlow knows what he is capable of, and he also knows what he is not capable of. He sticks to what he is best at and executes what is being asked of him. In the NBA, self-awareness can be a superpower all on its own, especially when paired with the sorts of physical and athletic gifts Barlow possesses.

An example: Nurse often refers to him as a good "ball transfer" guy. When the ball finds Barlow on the perimeter, he makes very quick decisions, and if there is not an immediate driving lane for him to attack, Barlow manages to make sure the ball quickly gets to someone equipped to create an advantage. He does a stellar job accentuating dynamic guards, and the Sixers have four of them. When Barlow has been on the floor alongside their three highest-minute guards in Maxey, VJ Edgecombe and Quentin Grimes, the Sixers have crushed the opposition.

Part of the appeal of that look: more opportunities for Barlow to, as he calls it, "punch gaps" after faking the dribble hand-off actions defenses have come to expect:

Barlow has great instincts, and one of the fashions they present themselves is when Barlow picks a spot to attack a defender instead of just getting the ball to the next guy. He has struck a terrific balance between transfers and drives. Defenses expect the transfers enough that the drives can catch them off guard, but they know the driving ability is there and cannot sell out on the player Barlow is likely to pass the ball to.

What is the determining factor in whether or not Barlow keeps the ball moving or tries to get downhill himself?

"Spacing, for sure," Barlow said on Tuesday. "If there's a gap, I try to punch it, but sometimes it matchup-based. If I feel like I can drive and get a shoulder bump and be able to attack and still get to the rim, I'd take that, too. So it's kind of a feel thing."

Because the Sixers trust Barlow, he has been empowered to make decisions as a short-roll passer. With Maxey playing at an All-NBA level, he sees plenty of blitzes out of pick-and-rolls. It creates four-on-three opportunities where the screen-setter has to make the right decision. Barlow has made major strides there, and it is an area where Walker already excels.

"Just understanding that [Maxey is] going to see more blitzes," Barlow said. "He's averaging near 35 [points] per game, so teams are going to be antsy to blitz early, make us beat them. And I take pride in making good decisions out of that, playing four-on-three, there's always going to be a guy open, so the quicker I can locate that – or if I'm the open guy, being able to attack the rim – is going to help us."  

21

The number of appearances made by Jabari Walker, highest among all two-way players in the NBA entering Saturday.

Walker, 23, came into the season with higher expectations, and he certainly has not disappointed. Walker's offensive rebounding has been an enormous boost, and after weeks of Nurse and Walker's teammates imploring him to shoot with confidence and insisting that he is an accurate three-point marksman, Walker connected on four straight triples in Friday's win over Milwaukee:

Walker's teammates typically erupt when he knocks down three-pointers. Walker is well-liked, but it runs deeper than that: the Sixers have continued to implore him to shoot, because they feel he is a much better shooter than he realizes.

"I'm really asking him frequently to take those threes, especially – again, he's a good shooter," Nurse said after Walker posted a double-double off the bench on Tuesday. "Like, his numbers and things that he charts, they're really high. But again, you've got to have the feel of meaningful games, just to get the confidence. We're really working hard to get him to take those... If he can just get to a stage where he can process it a little sooner, that he knows he's open as the ball's in the air coming to him and take a few more, he's going to make a bunch."

Tyrese Maxey, meanwhile, highlighted Walker's excellent preseason and training camp as a shooter.

"I just want him to shoot," Maxey said. "I've seen him shoot in Camden every day. Every training camp practice, he made every three. I'm like, 'Dude, you've got to shoot it. Shoot it. You made every three in training camp practices, so you've got the leeway to shoot it. And Nurse wants you to shoot. When Nurse wants you to shoot, you've got to shoot.'"

If Walker makes enough of his open spot-up triples for all of his other skills – dirty work on the glass, sturdy defense and short-roll passing – to continue to stand out, he has a chance to crack Nurse's regular rotation even when George is ramped up and Oubre returns. At the very least, he has already proven to be a quality mix-and-match option.

+11.0

The Sixers' Net Rating (point differential per 100 possessions) in 42 minutes with Jabari Walker and Dominick Barlow on the floor.

While most of Barlow's minutes have come at power forward, he has also been able to seamlessly slide up to the center spot when needed. It is where he finished that opening night win in Boston, and even though Nurse tries not to plan for Barlow to man the middle when he has Embiid, Andre Drummond and Adem Bona available, he has showed his cards enough times in high-leverage situations: he trusts Barlow at the five.

Whenever Nurse is asked about Barlow, he highlights the 22-year-old's combination of athleticism, effort and situational awareness. Barlow's ability to understand and implement the coaching staff's concepts has earned him significant faith.

"Probably the biggest thing is he'll execute," Nurse said last month. "Like, we're changing a ton of coverages; he'll execute them, which is big, to keep us all on the same page. He can switch, he can be a part of our blitz packages, and he'll not back down from any challenge from position one through five, he'll try to fight them."

Many of Barlow's best minutes at center have come alongside Walker, who is shorter but has more of a bruising style. While Nurse recently commented that Barlow and Walker are like two players tag-teaming one role, they also can coexist. They have done it for one reason: absolutely remarkable rebounding on both asides of the ball. The Sixers have rebounded 42.5 percent of their own misses with Barlow and Walker on the floor and over 70 percent of opposing misses. It is an enormous leg up when it comes to winning the possession battle:

Barlow view his responsibilities as being different when he slides up to the five?

"Just different defensively," Barlow said last month. "Probably have more responsibility just because you have to anchor the back line. But just playing. I mean, I understand that every day is going to look different and just [trying] to be ready for it."

25

The number of minutes logged by Hunter Sallis across six appearances.

With all of this being said, Barlow and Walker are not the Sixers' only two-way players. There is also undrafted rookie Hunter Sallis, a former top recruit in high school who scored 18.1 points per game in his two final collegiate seasons at Wake Forest. Sallis, 22, has gotten one very brief rotation cameo this season. He played two stints of less than a minute to help the Sixers get through the end of a half with some players in foul trouble. That was Sallis' NBA debut:

Since then, Sallis' five appearances have all come in garbage time. But he has been active 11 times, as the Sixers' plethora of injuries has necessitated activating him for the sake of adding another healthy body. In a crowded backcourt, Sallis' time is not now. But he is doing all of the work he believes will keep him positioned to take advantage of the first opportunity he gets. It is the position Edwards was in this time a year ago, and now the 21-year-old hometown kid is in the rotation on most nights and has a long-term standard contract.

Sallis' main priority, he told PhillyVoice in October, was becoming a more consistent three-point shooter. A down year from beyond the arc to complete his collegiate career is likely what sunk Sallis on draft boards, and he knows that on a team like this one he would largely play off the ball. Over a month later, Sallis told PhillyVoice he is excited about the results of that work so far.

"I feel like it's definitely getting a lot better," Sallis said. "I just keep taking strides every single day, just trying to get at least one percent better every day, and continuing with that."

44

The number of two-way activations remaining for the Sixers while their standard roster remains below 15 players.

The main rule with two-way players is that they can only be active 50 times (if a player is active and does not appear in the game, it still counts against their total). But another rule regarding two-way usage that the Sixers are running into: as long as they remain at 14 players on their standard roster, their collection of two-way players can only be active 90 times.

On Friday night, the Sixers passed the halfway point; they have now used up 46 of those 90 days. Here is where each player's remaining availability stands heading into Sunday's game vs. the Los Angeles Lakers:

The likeliest pathway for the Sixers, who have a roster spot open, is to use up these 44 days, then convert one of Walker or Barlow. At that point, they could use the remaining days of availability on the other player and then convert them to a standard deal when they run out.

If the Sixers get to a point in January where they are certain both of Walker and Barlow deserve conversions, Walker is likelier to get his standard deal first since he has nine fewer games remaining as of this writing. If not, it will be Barlow, who has likely already done enough to provide the team with that certainty.

How the Sixers clear a roster spot to ensure both players can be signed remains to be seen. The team could pursue a number of different directions at the trade deadline, and if they make a deal it could naturally open a roster spot and prevent any additional difficult decisions from being made. Otherwise, someone like Eric Gordon could be at risk of getting waived.

Make no mistake about it: this is a wonderful problem to have. For an organization that has struggled accumulating and retaining depth at many points during Embiid's career, the Sixers have capitalized on the two-way market to a tremendous degree in 2025-26. It could end up paying dividends for years to come.

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