The much anticipated 2024-25 Sixers have finally gotten to the track for games that count, and based on the early returns…well, they still need some work. The team has started the season 1-5good for the second-worst record in the East — and while there are plenty of reasons for that, sitting below the Pistons, Wizards, Hornets and Raptors in the standings is never ideal.
So, based on the limited selection of games we’ve seen so far, let’s highlight five takeaways about this team and what they could mean for the rest of the season, based on some advanced analytics.
The Maxey-only Sixers can be really bad
Tyrese Maxey is one of the game’s best young talents, and the Sixers’ early struggles shouldn’t necessarily be a reflection of his value as a player. Despite the team’s abysmal overall performance, he actually rates as a positive, according to Estimated RAPTOR (which considers him to have been worth +0.2 points above average per 100 possessions, including +1.7 on offense). This observation is really about the total version of the team that also does not include Joel Embiid or Paul George — leaving Maxey as the lone star to lead the list. (The Estimated RAPTOR metric estimates how many points a player contributes to his team’s offense and defense per 100 possessions.)
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Based on what we’ve seen, that configuration of the Sixers could be one of the worst teams in the NBA. In the first five games, with neither Embiid nor George in the lineup, Philly second worst in net ratings (-9.2), ahead of only the terrible Utah Jazz (-18.4 — yes, the Jazz have been terrible), while checking in at No. 27 on offense and No. 21 on defense. The offensive aspect may not be surprising, given how much is now placed on Maxey’s plate (and basically only his plate — see below), but Nick Nurse’s swarming defense has usually been able to make up for his team’s offensive shortcomings at the other end of the court . So it’s troubling to see subpar defense from this group, given how much Philly can rely on the Maxey-only version while handle the workload for both Embiid and George.
The cast doesn’t do enough
Without his co-stars, Maxey’s usage rate was up to 32.8% – one of those the biggest increases in the league compared to the previous year — and his efficiency struggled to keep up. His true shooting percentage dropped from 57.3% last year to 50.3% this year before George made his debut Monday night (league average is 57%). And given the fact that among the Philly regulars, only Kelly Oubre Jr. (25.1%) and rookie Jared McCain (25.8% while playing 12.8 minutes per game) also has usage rates above league average, Maxey basically got the bulk of the scoring and offensive creation while surrounded by a group of role players who haven’t been able to consistently do what they do best .
If we look at the combined estimated RAPTOR ratings for players other than Maxey, Embiid and George, which slide into Tobias Harris spot as the team’s third star at forward, every other regular on the team last year averaged -0.7 total rating per 100 possessions, including -1.1 points on offense and +0.3 on defense.
The supporting regular player of the year is down to -1.9 overall rating per 100, checking in at -1.1 on offense and -0.8 on defense. In other words, even after accounting for the absence of Embiid and George (to the best of our ability at this point) and Maxey’s increased workload, the rest of the roster is playing worse than last year’s supporting cast did, with defense being the primary offender.
At least there have been some bright spots
We mentioned the nurse brand’s aggressive defense earlier – and while the overall results haven’t been great yet, the building blocks are still there for this defense to come sooner or later. And the same goes for the reliable ball control offense that had the league’s lowest turnover rate last season.
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According to SportRadar dataThe 2024-25 Sixers rank better than 15th in only nine major statistical categories (out of a possible 35). But those nine categories include turnover differential per game (No. 3), fewest opponent steals per game (tied for seventh), steals per game (10th) and fewest turnovers per game (12th). Philly too ranks No. 2 in opponent turnover rate (16.1% of possessions) and No. 12 in the lowest turnover rate on offense (12.2%). And only the Lakers have a better relationship of free throw attempts per field goal attempt (0.336).
In that sense, then, the statistical skeleton remains from the factors that made the Sixers a dangerous team at their best under Nurse last season.
Embiid’s importance cannot be overstated
The flipside of the few categories where the Sixers rank among the top half of the league are a host of areas where they check in among the league’s worst. Remember how we said SportRadar tracks 35 major ranking categories? The Sixers rank 23rd or worse in well over half of them (20 stats).
And many of those categories underscore how critical Embiid’s presence is to this team, given how bad Philly has been without him. The worst categories for these Embiid-less Sixers? Opponent FG% (30th), rebounding differential per game (30th), defensive rebounds per game (30th) and assists per game (30th), with opponent blocks per game (29th), total rebounds per game (29th) and field goal percentage (29th) check in just slightly ahead. (They also rank just 25th in three-point percentage.)
Embiid is a four-time Defensive Player of the Year finalist and three-time All-Defensive Team selection, in addition to being the league’s sixth-most productive defensive rebounder and 12th ranked shot blocker over the past five seasons. So his absence will obviously seriously hurt the team’s ability to protect the rim and hit the defensive glass. But even the poor passing and shooting rankings reflect how much of a difference a healthy Embiid makes: he actually led the 2023-24 Sixers in assist rateahead of Maxey, and his .388 three-point percentage third among players who attempted at least 100 shots from downtown.
When Embiid plays, his fingerprints are on literally everything the Sixers do well. But he also stands out in absence with how bad they look without him.
We still don’t know the team’s full potential
With all that said, the full-strength Sixers remain one of the league’s biggest mysteries. We still have never seen Embiid, George and Maxey on the court in Sixers uniforms together, and we have only watched two preseason games and Monday’s loss to the Suns with George and Maxey. The alluring on-paper ceiling of this Big Three is the ceiling for a championship core if the trio can be ready for the playoffs — and that’s still 5½ months away.
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The biggest question may just be what kind of position the Sixers will be in come spring. The bad start has already dropped their playoff and title odds from 76.8% and 4.2% respectively in the preseason to 60.3% and 2.1% in my composite forecasting modeland while a star-studded version of this team at full strength could easily do that and then some, we still don’t really know how often that configuration of the Sixers will be deployed.
One thing seems safe to say: The more games Philly rolls out Maxey and the cast without any additional stars — the bad version of the Sixers we’ve seen to start the season — the more those odds will drop.
