Last year, nearly to the day, the Sixers held a raucous press conference at the National Constitution Center where the talk was about taking on the Miami Heat in the Eastern Conference Finals.
With Andrew Bynum on board, the sky was the limit.
A year later, Bynum is gone. So too is Doug Collins, team president Rod Thorn, general manager Tony DiLeo and CEO Adam Aron, the orchestrator of the pep rally/press conference.
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Wednesday afternoon at the Wells Fargo Center, the Sixers had another press conference only with a different tenor. In introducing new head coach Brett Brown after a four-month search, the team’s coach and general manager Sam Hinkie pleaded for patience.
Taking on the Heat to win the Eastern Conference? Not this year.
"Everybody's got a right to dream. I'm no different. It is such a long way away in my eyes," Brown said of the Sixers' return to be amongst the NBA's elite. "There's so much work to be done in order to even be able to think about that. It's fair to think and fair to dream, but it takes so much work and so much luck to get to that level. It's a great thing to aspire to, but it's a long road."
The rebuilding process can be both arduous and dangerous, Hinkie said. However, in the case of the Sixers coming off a disappointing 34-48 season, the process is necessary. For a first-time NBA head coach in Brown, it also will be a new experience. Brown spent the last 13 years as an assistant for Gregg Popovich and the San Antonio Spurs. The Spurs won four NBA titles during Brown’s tenure and lost last year’s Finals to Miami in seven games.
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Brown also was the head coach for the Australian national team in the 2012 Olympics and coached in the Australian pro league from 1988 to 2002 before joining the Spurs as the director of player development.
It’s Brown’s history in player development and working with players like Bruce Bowen and Tony Parker that set him apart from the rest of the coaching candidates, Hinkie said.
“It’s an important part,” Hinkie said. “We always talk about being partners and then on the second day that goes away. It happens too often. To go down a path like this there has to be trust. You can’t convince someone to go along with you and not have that because it’s a long journey. And [Brown] sees what I see and that is it’s worth doing.”
Player development is one thing, but coaching is a different animal. When it comes to coaching, especially a youthful and inexperienced roster like the one the Sixers are expected to have for the 2013-14 season, Hinkie has a lot mentors he can draw from for knowledge.
Brown played college ball at Boston University as a point guard for Rick Pitino. He also coached alongside international legend Lindsay Gaze in Australia. Then Brown joined Popovich’s staff, which is the icing on the cake.
From Pitino, Brown learned about playing point guard and about defense. Popovich was an example of accountability in that mistakes in January were treated the same as one made in Game 7 of the NBA Finals. And from Gaze, Brown learned that there are many different styles to the old American game.
But more than working with some of the all-time greats, Brown received his coaching gene from his father, Bob, who is in the New England sports Hall of Fame after coaching basketball in Maine for 50 years.
As an old point guard, a son of a coach and a long-time coach under some big names, Brown views the game from a defensive perspective. From defense comes offense, and with a young team Brown is hoping for an up-tempo style for the Sixers.
“We’re not going to sacrifice scoring because we want to play good defense,” Brown said. “I think it’s one of the great mistakes when people talk about defense. It doesn’t mean that you are going to be a low possession team. We want to go. We want to get out in the open court and we want to run.”
Again, it’s not going to be easy and there was chatter that Brown really weighed leaving San Antonio for a job with the Sixers because there is a lot of losing on the forecast for next season.
But when the Sixers’ ownership group led by Josh Harris came up with a four-year deal for Brown, the deal was sealed. That fourth year was very important, Brown said.
“It was important and I’m extremely grateful for the owners to take a step back,” Brown said. “It’s a reflection on what they think in that it’s going to take time. They really do have a tolerance and patience. And for as much as it was about security for me, it’s going to take time. It sends a message to the marketplace that they are in it for real.”
Last year, the Sixers dreamed of winning with Bynum and charting a new path. Wednesday, the Sixers introduced Brown and did not back off those dreams. The difference is they know it’s going to take a few years.
And a lot less fanfare, too.