One of the most profound revelations of growing up is realizing nobody knows anything. When I was a kid, it seemed like all the adults around me had a pretty good understanding of what was going on in the world around them. I was, of course, totally fucking bewildered, but I assumed that when I was older, everything would settle into making whatever kind of sense it was supposed to make.
It’s both upsetting and, happily, kind of inspiring to realize that’s not the case. To realize the world is a mess, maybe, is to begin to realize that you have the opportunity to tidy it up now and again.
Part of the reason everything’s such a mess, after all, is that everything’s so connected. We try to uncover what bits of wisdom we can, to give ourselves some strategies to lean on in the face of the pretty terrifying uncertainty of, like, just walking out the front door, but it’s hard. At our best, we thoughtfully tie what data we can to whatever we can gather from the gut. At our worst, it’s just all gut, all the time. We’re just fumbling around.
Anyway, I’ll get back to all that. Let’s talk about basketball. I was recently remembering that when I was a junior in high school, a couple of my friends and I coached a team of eighth graders in our town’s rec league. We loved basketball and had all kinds of thoughts about it, but our coaching strategy seemed to crystalize into one salient philosophy: screaming “GET BACK!!!” every time our opponents grabbed a defensive rebound or forced a turnover.
Getting back: it’s the holy grail of team basketball. It feels like such a small thing to consider, but the more I consider it, the larger it grows. Over the years, as I’ve grown more and more obsessed with basketball — and more and more curious and thoughtful about basketball’s mysteries — the concept of getting back has increased in mass. It’s taking in everything around it; it’s a singularity.
Take any assumption you have about basketball. Examine it, and you’ll realize it’s connected to getting back. You think it’s good to attack the basket on offense? Okay, but players who attack their basket often miss and go careening out of bounds, which leads to transition opportunities for the other team. When you attack the basket, you are a little more likely to not get back.
You think it’s good to move the ball and play unselfishly? Okay, but isolation plays average fewer turnovers per possession than other plays. Fewer isolation plays could mean more turnovers — more times when you’re not getting back.
Going for offensive rebounds? Running plays for corner 3s? Swinging the ball to the top of the key so you can move it to the second side? It turns out almost every decision a team makes on offense has implications about whether that team is able to get back on defense. And that’s without even considering all the human factors, like the reaction times of individual players, the predilection to hang one’s head after a bad play, etc.
During the 2022 playoffs, the Celtics became an interesting case study in getting back. During the regular season, according to Cleaning the Glass, the Celtics ranked first in halfcourt defense, but only seventh in transition defense. In the playoffs, things became even more extreme. Their league-best halfcourt defense got even stingier, but their transition defense fell all the way to 16th among the 20 playoff teams (including play-in teams).
What all of that meant is that when the Celtics were able to get back, their opponents didn’t have a prayer. When the Celtics avoided turnovers and made shots, it had the compounding effect of making their defense even more formidable. When they were bad on offense, it compromised their defense to an alarming degree. These factors together turned the Celtics playoff run into a serious rollercoaster ride. Runs, both ways, were extreme and frequent.
I’ve been thinking about all of that as I’ve watched the 76ers struggles early this season. I watched them lose to the Raptors last night in Toronto — a game in which the Sixers had an above-average night offensively but still somehow lost by 10. The Sixers lost, in fact, despite the fact that they outperformed the Raptors by almost six points per 100 possession in the halfcourt. What I’m saying is: the Sixers lost because their transition defense is hilariously bad. It’s so bad that it provides a perfect case study for what I’m talking about here.
Through five games, the 2022–23 Philadelphia 76ers have a worse transition defense than any other team in the entire Cleaning the Glass database going back to 2003–04. It’s the worst by almost four full points per 100 possessions. This 76ers team is basically a perfect storm of terrible transition defense.
Consider the factors. They play incredibly slow — they’re last in pace by a significant margin. They are near the top of the league in corner 3s, which means their floor balance is often compromised when they miss. They have an offense built around Joel Embiid and James Harden, two players who spend most of their time on offense flailing and falling and trying to bilk officials into calling fouls.
Of course, part of the point I’m trying to make is that the factors that are obvious to us are only part of the story. There are spiritual factors at work. How does the static, deliberate nature of the 76ers offense impact the speed at which players think and feel the game? Where is mood in all of this?
It’s kind of amazing, right? In basketball, to get where you want to go, you’ve got to get back. Ball is life, and its bewilderments are many.