GALLOWAY, N.J. — The Sixers are not some flip-it-and-get-rich(er) scheme for managing owner Josh Harris. Far from it.
In his annual training camp state of the team session with the press on Thursday at Stockton University, Harris said he plans on hanging around for the foreseeable future.
“The Sixers have been a good investment, but that’s not what’s driving us,” Harris said.
What is driving him is an NBA championship and turning the Sixers into an elite franchise in the league. Over the last three seasons, it’s been a painstaking process, Harris admits, but things are finally beginning to progress.
Harris said the team’s $70 million complex in Camden, New Jersey, is “surprisingly on time and on budget,” and he says he has the right coach and general manager for the job. Players like Nerlens Noel and Jahlil Okafor are cornerstone pieces to the franchise and the expectation is they will be around for a while, too.
But there is that matter of winning basketball games. That’s been the tricky part.
“I think we’re making progress,” Harris said. “I’m an impatient person at heart and I’d rather get to the end point as quickly as possible. But at the same time, the goal is still the same — to be an elite, extremely competitive team that goes far into the playoffs. Unfortunately, I’m very impatient and I wish we were further along than we are. But at the same time, there aren’t shortcuts. You have to react to the realities on the ground. I’m happy with the progress.”
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One of the realities on the ground has been injuries and waiting for the arrival of high draft picks. Noel missed a full season after being drafted in 2013 and Joel Embiid, though seemingly making progress, is going to miss a second straight season after undergoing bone-graft surgery over the summer.
Just when it looked like the Sixers were going to catch a break with a possible elite big man, they took a step back again.
“An elite big man is very hard to come by in this league. When we drafted Joel I thought it was a reasoned risk — a smart risk to take,” Harris said. “His progress looked promising until very late. It was very disappointing.”
Though players like Okafor are setting the goal high for this season, the reality is the Sixers went 37-127 over the past two years and Vegas bookmakers put the over/under on wins for the team this season at 21½.
So Harris is likely going to have to endure another season of rebuilding and taking baby steps, which he admits is very difficult yet necessary.
“I’m a human being and I have emotions like every fan. I sweat every loss. Not winning now is really tough on me,” Harris said. “But I don’t want to sacrifice the plan. I feel very comfortable that we’re moving up.
“I want to win today, but I’m not willing to sacrifice the long-term goals.”
Using the San Antonio Spurs as the model by building through the draft with a structure of coaching, analytics and sports science behind it, Harris says he’s unsure what the timetable is for the experiment to begin showing fruit.
He just knows a little more patience is needed.
“Hopefully sooner rather than later. It’s hard to put a timetable on it, but we have a lot of assets on the court,” Harris said. “We have Jahlil, we have Nerlens … we have a ton of people that are likely to be with us for a long period of time.”
And Harris fully expects to be one of those people around for a long time, too.
“I expect to happily be involved with the Sixers for many, many years,” Harris said. “There are no plans to sell [the team]. Our ultimate goal has not changed and that’s to bring an NBA championship to Philly.”