By Brandon Apter, Sports Talk Philly Staff
11 games into the season, the Sixers are 6-5 with all their wins coming at home and all of their losses on the road. For a team that won 52 games a season ago, they look like a group that is still far from finding their footing. Their lack of perimeter shooting is becoming more magnified by the day and their starting back court is hesitant to take jump shots. Not necessarily the best recipe for success. Ben Simmons looks to have improved defensively in the offseason, but nothing seems to have changed on offense. That's good and bad.
As for Markelle Fultz, we've seen slow progress on both sides of the ball, but there's still not a whole lot of confidence in his shot quite yet, which is to be expected. During Sunday's disheartening loss to the Nets in Brooklyn, it was a bit more of the same from Fultz. Nothing special, finishing with nine points on 3-for-8 shooting, including this forgettable miss from deep.
What is this? pic.twitter.com/9rWtxmbEYv
— Tony DelGrosso (@TonyD_4) November 5, 2018
It's clear that Fultz still has a ways to go with his development. He's a few steps/years behind Joel Embiid and Ben Simmons and that's okay considering what happened last year. If this team wants to start being successful though, someone has to be able to make perimeter shots in the starting lineup beyond Robert Covington. Per usual, Sixers fans took to Twitter last night to voice their displeasure on the loss and one fan actually caught Drew Hanlen's attention. Hanlen responded with what seems to be information about Fultz's health, but then deleted his tweet.
Drew Hanlen tweeted yesterday that Markelle Fultz is still not healthy. The tweet has since been deleted… pic.twitter.com/o6b1jxYumV
— Vote The Process (@VoteTheProcess) November 5, 2018
This also begs the question…healthy physically or mentally? Because Hanlen had mentioned Fultz's yips before.
After a 122-97 loss to the lowly Nets, add being concerned about Fultz's health again to the list of worries so far in the young season. The former top pick is averaging 9.3 points, 4.1 rebounds and 3.5 assists in 11 games this season, shooting 39.3 percent from the floor and 30.8 percent from three-point range.