The Sam Hinkie Dossier (part 3)

Another method for accumulating players is through free agency. As Sixers GM Sam Hinkie signed 26 free agents: Adonis Thomas, Brandon Davies, Casper Ware, Christian Wood, Daniel Orton, Darius Johnson-Odom, Dwayne Dedmon, Drew Gordon, Eliot Williams, Elton Brand, Gani Lawal, JaKarr Sampson, James Anderson, James Nunnaly, Jarvis Varnado, Jordan Railey, Larry Drew, Lorenzo Brown, Malcolm Lee, Nayal Koshwal, Phil Pressey, Pierre Jackson, Ronald Roberts, Solomon Alabi, Tim Frazier, Tim Ohlbrecht.

Only 2 (Brand, Wood) were still on the roster at the end of the 2015-16 season. (I can see Brand coming back for another year as 'veteran presence'. Given how many bigs the Sixers have, Wood seems like someone else's Summer League fodder)

9 others finished 2015-16 on NBA rosters (Williams, Anderson, Dedmon, Davies, Sampson*, Frazier, Brown, Pressey). (Dedmon, Brown, and Sampson seem likely to stick in the league for at least a little while, not sure about the rest)

I think 5 others (Ware, Gordon, Johnson-Odom, Lawal, Varnado) are playing in Europe. (Hey, good for them!)

Near as I can tell 8 (Thomas, Orton, Nunnaly, Railey, Lee, Roberts, Alabi, Olbrecht) are completely out of basketball. I have no idea whatever happened to Larry Drew or Nayal Koshwal but I'm certain they're no longer in the NBA.

I think Pierre Jackson has signed on to the Knicks Summer League squad, so the former D League stand out looks to get at least one more shot at some NBA time.

So out of the 26 signings, none came anywhere near an All-Star Game. Only 7 (Anderson, Brand, Davies, Williams, Wood, Sampson, Pressey) played noteworthy minutes for the Sixers. And I would suggest only 1 (Brand) might be back in the post-Hinkie era. Not a lot of good cards in that hand, absolutely nothing for Hinkie to hang his hat on. He certainly did not produce wins on the court and didn't leave much behind for future development. In his defense (though this is a pretty sorry defense): Hinkie wasn't trying to win games in his three years in Philly. I'm sure he would've been more than happy to sign great young players but given his desire for draft picks and to save money, these three years were not a time of pulling out all the stops to sign big names. He signed under-the-radar players on the cheap hoping they would develop. I can't say any of them did.

I would suggest that this, more than anything, is why Brian Colangelo was brought in to replace Hinkie: if you can't recruit big time free agents, your ceiling for NBA success will probably always remain low. That said, I would suggest that Summer 2016 was always the time that Hinkie was aiming toward in terms of making major moves, whether signings or trades, but was robbed of the chance to be there when the time came.

His free agency record is not strong but it wasn't meant to be, was it? He wasn't concerned with winning or spending money, so though this crop of signings isn't superlative, circumstances prevented him from putting his best foot forward. We can heap the blame on Hinkie, though I'd rather acknowledge that this strategy was well known to his bosses and benefactors...and they hired him anyway. Hinkie was doing what he said he was going to do. While I can't give him any high marks, I don't feel like I can admonish his record too much either.


* (Funny JaKarr Sampson story: Remember the Rockets-Pistons trade that was to send Motiejunas and Marcus Thornton to Detroit for a #1 pick that got voided? That was actually a 3-team deal in which Philly was to get a salary dump for a draft pick (Joel Anthony if I'm not mistaken). In order for the deal to work Philly had to release Sampson, apparently with the understanding that after Anthony was also released, the Sixers would bring Sampson back. Instead, the Pistons backed out of the trade and Sampson signed a multi-year deal with the Nuggets. Oh well.)