Translator's Note: The original article was published in The Athletic. The data in the article are as of the time of publication of the original article (November 1, local time). The dates and times involved are all local time.

As a major scourge of mankind, it has always been a bet only made by fools and a sustenance for the weak-willed. It means avoiding the difficult, challenging but rewarding work of team building through hard work and rejecting shortcuts.

Until VJ-Edgecomb fell into your hands for nothing because of a bad display, everything changed!

On Friday Halloween night, the 76ers faced the old rival Celtics at home. The venue was almost full, and the audience cheered them on again.

And, just as they have done time and time again so far this season, the 76ers rallied from a big deficit, fought back from a 23-point deficit in the first half, narrowed the deficit to just one point in the final seconds, and had a chance to win a game they shouldn't have won. However, Joel Embiid's buzzer-beating three-pointer hit the back edge of the basket, and the Celtics narrowly won 109-108, giving the 76ers their first loss of the season.

However, this does not matter. Fans who were booing and not attending just a few months ago are now back. And even though the season is less than two weeks into the season, the team's once-fading hopes have been rekindled. Edgecombe wasn't the only reason, but he was one of the most important reasons.

"Obviously, everything is going to be okay just because we can win, and last year was a disaster," Embiid said. "Guys, mainly me, weren't able to play, weren't at their best, and there were a few other guys who missed most of the season. Obviously, the situation was. It can't get any worse than that. So now as long as things get better, it feels good."

Everyone had injuries last season, starting with Embiid, who missed the last two months with a recurring knee injury and had arthroscopic surgery in April and played in just 19 games all season. Throughout the season, injuries also hit Paul George, Tyrese Maxey and Jared McCain. The team president said after last season's finale, the 58th loss, that he and the team had failed Philadelphia fans.

Of course, a large part of this is deliberate.

When it became clear that the team couldn't overcome the injuries to Embiid and the core lineup, the 76ers, so to speak, turned their focus to developing young players.

Starting from the end of January, the 76ers had a record of 19 wins and 27 losses. Although not ideal but not hopeless in the Eastern Conference, the 76ers only achieved a record of 5 wins and 31 losses in the remaining games of the season. In order to ensure that their first-round pick was not sent to the Thunder as part of the deal that sent away Al Horford in 2020, the 76ers had to finish last season with a record in the bottom six in the league.

Marcus Bagley played 43 minutes in the season finale, which was only his 10th NBA game. The 76ers ended the season with the sixth-worst record in the league.

However, despite their unsatisfactory performance at the end of the season, the 76ers not only retained their first-round pick, but the pick also jumped to the No. 3 pick.

After the Mavericks (who had a 1.5% chance of winning the No. 1 pick) selected Cooper Flagg and the Spurs (who had a top-four pick for the third consecutive year) selected Rutgers guard Dylan Harper, the 76ers selected Edgecombe, who had established a strong defensive reputation after playing one season at Baylor University and looked like he would be a good piece of the team's puzzle.

However, the 20-year-old Edgecombe has shown enough maturity to allow him to quickly adapt to the professional league.

"He's willing to be in the right place at the right time," 76ers forward Kelly Oubre said. "He's willing to execute the coaching staff's game plan. That's very rare. It usually takes players a while to get used to the rhythm of the game and the various terms."

"He seems to have it. And he works hard. He watches a lot of game film, and he loves the game. I think those are excellent qualities to be a great basketball player."

Edgecombe is certainly tasked with defending, which is what most teams consider his specialty. On Friday, he guarded Jaylen Brown, Derrick White and Payton Pritchard. But he also shot a very high three-point percentage, certainly exceeding many teams' expectations when he left Baylor, where his shooting was inconsistent.

After going 2-for-4 from 3-point range on Friday -- the first time Edgecombe played 40 minutes in back-to-back games -- he is now shooting 44 percent (14-for-32) from beyond the arc this season.

The lightning speed he and Maxi displayed when partnering in the backcourt will become an absolute nightmare for opponents. The 76ers once fielded a small lineup consisting of Maxey, Edgecombe, Oubre and Quentin Grimes, and it worked well for a long time.

What is certain is that if the 76ers want to really make a difference this season, they need Embiid to play at a level close to his MVP season. But they now have a promising future, with Maxey, Edgcomb, Grimes and McCain (as he recovers from a torn ligament in his right thumb) forming one of the best guard rotations in the East.

"VJ has been great," Maxey said. "He does a great job of just going out there and playing his game. That's the most important thing. As a rookie, he doesn't waver or flinch, and we don't want him to do that. We don't want him to be timid. We want him to go out there and be himself.. ”

Again: Edgecombe is here this season because the Sixers didn’t want to win last season. Embiid became one of the best players in the league because the Sixers showed no interest in competing for years — yes, years — until “the process "Bring him to the team in 2014. The 76ers selected Embiid with the third overall pick that year.

Moreover, the reason why Victor Vunbanyama can play a dominant performance in San Antonio is... well, this is what the Spurs will do in 2022- The starting lineup in the final game of the 23rd regular season: Julian Champany, Sandro Mamukelashvili, Keita Bates-Diop, Malakai Branham and Trey Jones. Their record that season was 22 wins and 60 losses, and two months later, the team's fate. The fortunes have changed.

To be sure, even though the league has been chipping away at the lottery odds for years, the betting scandal that engulfed the NBA last week implicated many teams that were either already failing or on the verge of failing. Marginal players on some teams who (allegedly) can sit themselves out of games so that their gambling friends can make a fortune betting on player statistics.

When a team has no intention of winning, it's easy for players on the team to squander statistics.

However, every season, multiple teams believe there is no other way to acquire those talented players who can change the destiny of the team, and they will usually only appear in the high picks of the draft if they don't think so-if the data shows "high first-round draft picks." "It doesn't matter if it's low, you can pick great players at the 18th, 23rd and 37th picks" - then no one will mess up. Why do you think that those NBA team management who always weigh the probabilities through data analysis and other methods, when they use bad stuff to maximize the gains of team building? When the probability of the cornerstone suddenly becomes stupid?

The team sucks because this trick still works. Or, at least, it works enough that it is worth giving up one or more failed seasons and hoping for the future.

Author: David. Aldridge

Translator: GWayNe