August 18, 2026
Colleen Claggett/for PhillyVoice
Sixers head coach Nick Nurse's fourth season in Philadelphia will be his biggest yet.
After the three years Sixers head coach Nick Nurse has had to begin his time in Philadelphia, it is hard to imagine he will be complaining about having too many high-caliber scorers in 2026-27.
Nurse has almost never gotten the chance to coach healthy Sixers teams during his tenure with the team. But now, no single injury will leave Nurse without firepower.
With a five-headed monster of Tyrese Maxey, VJ Edgecombe, Jaylen Brown, LeBron James and Joel Embiid comprising Nurse's new starting lineup, the options – and opportunities – are endless. But with infinite choices come infinite questions. The only thing certain about Nurse's rotation: He will be relying on staggering, ensuring he has multiple starters on the floor at all times. That will be the Sixers' superpower.
But even after acknowledging that fact, there are lots of decisions to make. In this week's Sixers mailbag, diving into Nurse's options when it comes to staggering his stars:
From @JTGD13: What are your thoughts on which starters will be staggered with each other? Personally leaning toward Maxey, VJ, Brown then Embiid and LeBron together.
I have thought about this a whole lot, even for weeks before James officially signed with the Sixers. At the end of the day, I believe the only thing Nurse must do is enter the playoffs with a strong sense of which combinations of his stars perform the best. That will require plenty of experimentation and on-the-fly changes, even when things are going well, which in itself requires a lot of discipline.
There is no doubt Nurse is thinking through all sorts of permutations of two or three of his five projected starters, and the truth is there is no assembly of those players that will not look quite appetizing on paper. The Sixers have quite a few malleable role players capable of sliding into supporting roles alongside whichever combinations Nurse goes with.
Embiid is somewhat of a wild card in all of the different ideas Nurse can come up with as far as splitting up his starters is concerned. Of all five Sixers starters, he is the one expected to play many fewer games and minutes than the rest – and Embiid plays such a specific style at such a specific pace that it is hard for him to be part of any five-man unit that is not catered to him.
Joel Embiid in the biggest win of his career in Game 7 in Boston on Saturday:
— Adam Aaronson's clips (@SixersAdamClips) May 3, 2026
34 points
12 rebounds
6 assists
Full highlights: pic.twitter.com/CLjIXZ4wpc
So, does Embiid need to be specifically staggered at all? Perhaps it is easier to conceptualize this by coming up with two pairings out of Maxey, Edgecombe, Brown and James, then sprinkling Embiid minutes in with both of them. That would also make it easier to withstand Embiid's inevitable absences without disrupting Nurse's substitution patterns too much.
To me, the central question Nurse has to answer as he comes up with his Plan A for staggering: is it more important to utilize the potential synergy of Maxey and James sharing the floor, or to have someone capable of playing a steady point guard on the floor at all times by splitting them up more often?
MORE: Full 2026-27 Sixers schedule, with details and analysis
There is no debating that James is far and away the Sixers' strongest creator for others, and even though playmaking has never been one of Maxey's strengths, he is a more reliable player there than either of Edgecombe or Brown. Perhaps the standard line of thinking would be to split Maxey and James up a decent bit; that way the Sixers would always have a trustworthy shot creator on the court.
But the more I have thought about it, the more I have leaned towards pairing Maxey and James up as much as possible early in the season. Their strengths just make for such a beautiful match that I think the Sixers have to explore it first, even while acknowledging the need to eventually test out other arrangements.
After the 2025-26 season ended, Maxey was honest speaking about his desire to get off the ball more. He has been one of the highest-usage on-ball players in the NBA in recent years, but that has been out of necessity. He is one of the best off-ball players in the entire league, but the Sixers have not had the ability to capitalize on that. Now, they do. Playing alongside each other, Maxey and James will each be able to seamlessly toggle between playing on and off the ball.
When Maxey has operated as a pick-and-roll ball-handler, defenses have swarmed. If it is James screening for Maxey, a blitz will allow James to become a lethal 4-on-3 playmaker. Defenses do not want to see this:
LeBron James will be the best short-roll and 4-on-3 passer in the NBA on the Sixers. He is going to have many opportunities to find his teammates in advantage situations: pic.twitter.com/zUY5L77i3m
— Adam Aaronson's clips (@SixersAdamClips) July 25, 2026
Meanwhile, if James has the ball, Maxey can screen for him, too. Having guards screen has been one of the staples of James' offense for many years; it allows him to either punch an open gap by driving downhill with force or isolate against a much smaller player. Then there are the many other ways Maxey and James fit: they can both be lethal transition scorers and creators, James can be a half-court organizer while Maxey darts around screens and Maxey can drive and kick to James for second-side attacks.
If Maxey and James stick together more often than not, the same will be true for Brown and Edgecombe. Given the composition of this roster, Anfernee Simons slotting into the backcourt would be a consistent part of this look for the Sixers, adding some much-needed three-point shooting around Brown.
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Jaylen Brown's strengths | Jaylen Brown's weaknesses
Anfernee Simons | Dean Wade | Ariel Hukporti
Edgecombe made significant strides as a ball-handler and playmaker last season, even if he is not a full-blown point guard. For better or worse, lineups centered around Brown do not always need a high-level creator. Simons and Edgecombe are each serviceable, and that will be enough in spurts.
That is because Brown's superpower – and the Sixers must find ways to tap into it – is usurping offensive possessions in bulk while maintaining decent efficiency. Brown's self-created scoring inside the arc cannot carry a team to a championship, but it can keep an offense afloat for minutes, quarters or games at a time.
If the Sixers can establish their spacing even close to as well as the Boston Celtics do, it will allow Jaylen Brown to thrive as a one-on-one scorer: pic.twitter.com/QPkb4H8zMF
— Adam Aaronson's clips (@SixersAdamClips) July 4, 2026
It is fair to point out that if Edgecombe spends the bulk of his time playing in a star-studded lineup or in a unit built around Brown's high-volume, low-creation style, he will not have tons of opportunities to hunt his own shots. That is true. But the reality is that somebody has to play with Brown, the lone Sixers star without a real track record of making his teammates better. At the very least, the Sixers can offer Edgecombe many more on-ball reps in a unit like this.
Ultimately, Nurse has an enormous number of options at his disposal, and none of them are bad options. Diversifying looks over the course of the season should be the priority above all else – not for reasons relating to in-game strategy or unpredictability, but for the sake of collecting information.
As far as a Plan A goes, though, pairing up Maxey and James just feels too enticing to pass up. The rest of the chips will fall naturally from there.
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James' decision | Projecting Sixers' rotation | James' impact, on and off the court
