A Fan's Story | Philly4for4

I didn’t always care for basketball.

Growing up twenty minutes outside of Philadelphia, it was difficult to escape sports of any kind, so of course I picked up things here and there.

Whenever I rode with my dad anywhere, he put 610 WIP on the radio and I would listen to local sports talk hosts debate any and all things Sixers. They’d lament about the failures of recent draft picks—how could they take Larry Hughes ahead of Paul Pierce? Who thought Keith Van Horn would be better than Tracy McGrady? They’d question Larry Brown’s rotations, crush the team for bad losses, and complain about Allen Iverson’s lack of support.

I had friends that loved it too. During recess, it was nothing for me to watch other kids play hotly contested full court games on the blacktop. They’d shout and puff their chests when they made stylish layups or outside jumpers and declare themselves the next Ray Allen or Kobe Bryant or Vince Carter.

But it never really resonated with me.

Sure, it was cool watching the SportsCenter Top 10 plays and seeing the half court buzzer beaters, blocks into the third row, circus layups, and any other spectacular feats of athleticism NBA players displayed. Still, there was something about basketball itself as a sport that failed to click with me.

Compared to baseball, it was far too chaotic for my taste. It didn’t seem as tactically or strategically complex as football. I wasn’t much of a hockey fan either those days, but I appreciated the way that sport balanced grace with violence. Basketball didn’t do that either, at least I didn’t think it did.

And then I opened my eyes.

I realized the chaos of the game is what made it so impressive when one team systematically deconstructed an opponent’s half court defense with an array of sharply executed passes until the ball found the open man for an uncontested corner 3. The tactics and strategy of the game were in every offensive set out of a timeout, every substitution during a free throw, every switch on the perimeter. I noticed that balance between grace and violence when two players got out in transition on a fast break, and one lobbed a pass with a deft touch to another for a vicious dunk.

Catching ESPN highlights slowly turned into watching a few minutes of live games here and there. Those few minutes became entire quarters, and eventually I graduated to watching games from start to finish, and soon I was meeting my friends an hour late on hang out nights because I just wanted to watch the beginning of some games—and that inevitably stretched into the first half.

And through this entire transformation, there were the Philadelphia 76ers.

I really got on board with the team when Doug Collins became the head coach ahead of the 2010-2011 season. I remember sitting in the parking lot listening to sports talk radio—my dad clearly rubbed off on me—and they were praising the hire, noting that Collins was nothing if not passionate and real, the type of personality Philly fans love. I remember his Sixers team being the very first regular season victory for the Big 3 era Miami Heat, who had added Chris Bosh and some guy named LeBron James in the offseason. Not the easiest first matchup.

I remember the lockout year, Andre Iguodala’s last in a Sixers uniform. They were surprisingly competitive, getting out to a 14-6 start, finishing 35-31, and even winning a playoff series. They beat the Bulls in six games—the first of which will live in infamy as the game Tom Thibodeau should have pulled Derrick Rose with a 20-point lead and just six minutes to play. He didn’t, Rose blew out his knee, and a potential future Hall of Famer’s career was never the same.

Enthralling as basketball could be, I learned it could be a very cruel sport too.

I remember the failed Andrew Bynum acquisition. I don’t think I’ve gone bowling since that season—when he never suited up for a single game for the Sixers.

I remember being hurt when they traded away Jrue Holiday, officially ushering in the Process years with Brett Brown at the helm. It actually started off pretty good—in Brown’s very first game as a coach, his opponent was the very same Heat who Collins faced to begin his tenure. This time, though, the Sixers came out on top. Michael Carter-Williams scored 22 points and dished out 12 assists in his NBA debut. They won their next two games to start the year 3-0, and I almost bought the Kool-Aid.

But it was fool’s gold. Instead of hoisting banners at the Wells Fargo Center and parading down Broad Street, I remember sitting through three seasons of basketball in which the team I had grown to love won all of 47 games, failing to reach even 20 wins every year. They started guys with anonymous names like James Anderson, Henry Sims and Hollis Thompson. Prized draft picks Nerlens Noel and Jahlil Okafor flamed out in spectacular fashion for one reason or another, and it seemed to be all for naught.

And I remember the first time I saw Joel Embiid play, and immediately thought it was worth it. In his first year, they won 28 games. With Embid and now Ben Simmons as a running mate, they eclipsed 50 the next two seasons, and won a playoff series both years. I remember trading for Jimmy Butler.

I remember trading away Jimmy Butler. I remember scandals with front office executives, and burner Twitter accounts, and firing coaches, and hiring coaches, and constant roster reshuffling, and…

It’s been an exhausting decade plus being a Philadelphia 76ers fan.

But I have come to be familiar with these wild emotional highs and lows, and now recognize them as part of the fan experience. It parallels very closely the cadence of a basketball game—one team races out to a big lead, the other team responds with a run of their own, and it becomes a back and forth affair with bursts from both sides from there.

Regardless of how ecstatic I am over a spirited win, or devastated by a crushing loss, I love the team all the same.

Basketball, I’ve found, is a beautiful game, and the Sixers are its beating heart.