Brett Brown knows managing Nerlens Noel, Sixers' center logjam is a tall order
He said it would be an 'extreme challenge' if Nerlens Noel and Jahlil Okafor both stayed on the roster
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2 min read
Brett Brown has a big problem. The Philadelphia 76ers coach said Saturday that he was caught off guard by Nerlens Noel voicing his frustration on Friday. Noel, who was playing in just his second game of the season because of a left knee injury, told reporters that he was too good to be playing just eight minutes and the Sixers "need to figure this shit out."
Brown knew that, if the front office could not facilitate a trade, the day would come when Noel, Joel Embiid and Jahlil Okafor were all healthy. It has been tricky enough for him to try to play two of the three together, especially now that stretch 4 Ersan Ilyasova is around and Richaun Holmes is looking like yet another solid option at center. Brown told reporters it would be difficult to navigate this situation if no move is made before the trade deadline, via the Philadelphia Inquirer's Keith Pompey:
"I think it would be an extreme challenge," the Sixers coach said after practice Saturday.
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"If you went to our owners, if you went to [president] Bryan [Colangelo], if you went to our team, me, we appreciate it's a challenging situation," Brown said. "To tick off an untenable, to tick off on it's impossible, I'm not going there."
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"You hear me talk about the ecosystem of our team and it's real," Brown said. "The things that go on can affect others, as we are seeing. So how I manage this I think is going to be fluid."
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They're trying to find out if the twin-towers set is successful in transition defense. They want to see if they can find a place for Okafor when they integrate Embiid into the post during that set. They eventually plan on seeing how Noel looks with Embiid.
"I feel that his arrival into the team, his trying to get in shape ... it has been so erratic," Brown said of Noel. "It has been so completely infrequent that you naturally go to Jahlil sooner than Nerlens as it relates to pairing with Joel.
"So over time, I am interested in that. I think it has some defensive attraction, for sure."
To reiterate what Sixers fans have been talking about for what seems like forever: Neither Noel nor Okafor seem like a long-term fit in Philadelphia given that the franchise is committed to Embiid and No. 1 pick Ben Simmons. Noel is the easier one to find a place for now, given that his defensive aptitude and rebounding ability is miles ahead of Okafor's. Unlike Noel, though, Okafor has been around the team all year, and he has not publicly criticized the organization for keeping everybody around.
Noel did, however, express some remorse for going public with his complaints, via PhillyVoice's Rich Hofmann:
"You might get emotional sometimes," Noel said. "I'm human and I want to play basketball at the highest level, and that should be expected. So now I'm moving forward, taking it day-by-day, keep on improving, getting after it in practice, and building on things so when the time's right, the time's right."
One thing to remember here: Noel is in a contract year. The last thing he wants right now is to be the third guy in Philadelphia's center rotation, especially when it's time to prove his value to the rest of the league. Nobody has a worse record than the 6-20 Sixers, and nobody has a trickier balancing act than Brown.
