There is no denying that the relationships between NBA players on and off-the-court has changed over the last 15 years.  In this era of AAU basketball, powerhouse sports agents, mega sneaker contracts and social media, the majority of today’s NBA stars are well connected to each other and former players.  Thus, tey have no problem texting an on-the-court rival for advice or working out with a division foe in the off-season or reaching out to a retired hoops legend in order to learn a new move.

Magic, Larry and Mike would never have dreamed of doing such things.

Again, times have changed and so today we are launching a new series here at Philadunkia.com that works off the above premise regarding current NBA players and applies it to the members of the 76ers roster.  Which current and/or former players should key members of the Sixers pursuit gym time with in order to develop and improve their game outside of Brett Brown’s watch?

First up, is arguably the most polarizing youngster on Brett Brown’s team — Tony Wroten.

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Long before the NBA’s marketing juggernaut placed it’s time, money and television network fully behind the Orlando Pro Summer League and the NBA Summer League in Las Vegas, the only time a hoop head like me got to watch his favorite pro ballers in the off-season was on the rare occasion where one of them would drop in for a run at the local summer Pro Am.  

Back in the day, tales of appearances by NBA players at the Drew League, Rucker Park, the Goodman League (a.k.a. Barry Farms), Seattle Pro Am, North Carolina Pro Am, etc., were passed on by word of mouth.  In the 90′s and early 2000′s grainy mixtapes preserved the efforts of guys from the League at “playground” games against eager local cats.  In the era of the iPhone and Go Pros, Youtube is now filled with crisp, clean HD video of these summer basketball sightings.

After the jump I pulled together a few of my favorite legends of summer basketball that involve former or current players from Philadunkia’s home team.

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The double tank may be on for the 76ers, but the team’s bid to be crowned double summer league champs came to an end last night after a slow start to the 4th quarter produced 79–68 loss to the Chicago Bulls.

The Summer Sixers were led by Jordan McRae who scored 25 points on 7 of 8 shooting and 10 – 10 from the charity stripe. Nerlens Noel posted 14 points on 5-13 shooting from the field. Former Clemson star KJ McDaniels tallied 11 points in the loss.

Still the Sixers loss and McRae’s outstanding performance took a backseat last night after Noel went down hard and hobbled to the locker room late in the game.

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Despite not having Nerlens Noel, K.J. McDaniels and Jordan McRae — all out with ankle sprains — the Summer Sixers posted a  85-63 win over the Los Angeles Lakers last night to advance in the elimination round of play at the NBA Summer League in Las Vegas.

After a stalemate first quarter (20-20l), Casper Ware and the 76ers summer reserves opened the 2nd qurter with a 16-0 run that extended out to a 24-4 stretch.  That 22 point cushion helped the Sixers (2-2) keep the Lakers at arm’s length for the rest of the game.   

The Sixers were led in scoring by Sean Kilpatrick and Elijah Millsap who each posted 19 points.

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“Tyler, you always get to the airport 2 hours before your flight…ALWAYS.” That’s the wise words of my old man for you. With the Orlando Pro Summer league ending and my journey back home beginning I have a lot of time to think about each Sixer individually and how they preformed this past week.

Nothing is certain in professional sports, especially the guys that are playing their hearts out just to be invited to training camp. That being said the 76ers Orlando summer squad played surprisingly well and it will be interesting to witness how they perform in Las Vegas.  But before we movbe on to Sin City, let’s wrap up the action in O-Town.  Without further delay here is my assessment of the individual players and how they faired down here in Florida.

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The 76ers have brought a championship back to the City of Brotherly Love!

While it might only be the Orlando Pro Summer League championship the Sixers have continued to showcase their young talent and win all week long.

The Sixers played in the OPSL championship game this afternoon against another strong contender down here, the Memphis Grizzlies. Coming into this game the Sixers had won three straight games, only losing too the Orlando Magic the first game they played this week.

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For Philadunkia nation, the Orlando Pro Summer League is worth watching for many reasons.  We get the chance to see our 2014 high 2^nd round draft picks take the floor.  We get to see Travis Bader, the 3-point specialist, fight for a spot on the team.  Fans also get to see the emergence of high-flying, St. Joe’s product Ronald Roberts, Jr. making highlight reel plays.

All of these players are reasons why fans are tuning in to watch the 76ers in Orlando, but these rookies aren’t the main attraction.  What keeps fans glued to the television is the mystery that is Nerlens Noel.

The defensive center finally took the floor on Saturday afternoon for the 76ers after a year of rehabbing a torn ACL.  The debut of Noel was a sight for sore eyes, especially for Sixers fans, who struggled through the team’s 19 win season in 2013-14.

Not known for his offensive touch, Nerlens did a great job in his first action of the summer, finishing with 19 points and 4 steals.  .  Noel’s summer league debut was great, but what can we expect from him during the regular season?

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Tough physical basketball was the name of the game being played Sunday as the Sixers defeated the Thunder 84-73.

Even better for Philadunkia nation was that the Sixers won big without even having to bring out their star center Nerlens Noel.  Don’t worry; Noel’s knee is fine after putting up 19 points Saturday in his debut game against the Orlando Magic.  The Sixers staff is just sitting him as a precautionary strategy and letting the big man get some rest to finish out this week, then preparing to take off to Las Vegas for another summer league appearance.

There’s no doubt that the 7-6 showed up to play today as they blew past the Thunder.  I looked up at one point to see that the Sixers had taken a 16-point lead, which ended up being their biggest lead of the night.  Ware, Bader, Roberts, and McDaniels all put on a clinic offensively and most importantly looked like each one of them was confident playing their own game.

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A promising and competitive showing was seen from the 76ers yesterday as they played their first game against the home team, the Orlando Magic in the opening day of the Orlando Pro Summer League.  The Sixers were defeated by the Magic 83-77 but a lot can be taken away from the first game down here in sunny Florida.

First, Nerlens Noel had his NBA debut and it didn’t take long at all for him to make a strong impact. Noel had the first field goal of the game with a tremendous dunk that shook Amway Center only 30 seconds after tipoff.  Every Philly fan can breathe a sigh of relief because Noel looked confident and comfortable for not playing a competitive game of basketball in over a year.  Noel finished with 19 points against the Magic.  The big man also knocked down an outstanding 7-7 free throws proving that he has been working very hard on that part of his game.

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On Monday the 76ers announced that Sam Hinkie had decided to waive shooting guard James Anderson bringing an end to his predictable time in a Sixers uniform.  The Sixers claimed Anderson off of waivers on July 16, 2013 and at the time he was hailed as an undervalued talent who owned a lethal jumper from deep.  Most of that turned out to be false.

Anderson appeared in 80 games last year for the Sixers, starting in 62 of those games,  and averaged 10 points, 4 rebounds and shot a paltry 32.8% from three.  Anderson did show an ability to drive the ball to the cup, but his lackluster performance from behind the arc, the fact that he was a liability on defense and salary cap factors led to his release by Hinkie.

The release of Anderson saves the 76ers about $1million dollars, but more importantly the move now opens up a wing spot in the 76ers’ first five.  So once again this year, the 76ers will head to training camp wondering who will be the starting shooting guard on opening night

After the jump we’ll examine the candidates to fill that spot.

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