We know this city is still reeling over the Eagles playoff loss and also the preoccupied with who is going to bat 5th for the Phillies this spring, but the Sixers have played some decent ball of late and if the season ended today, Doug Collins & Co. would be a participant in the 2011 NBA Playoffs.

So Philadunkia scribes Nabeel Ahmadieh and Kevin Jones are back with another podcast to help you focus on the NBA season and specifically our improving 76ers.

Among the numerous topics Nabeel and Kevin discuss on today’s podcast :

• The recent 5 up and 4 down run
• Louis Williams’ heroics and his role as the Sixers closer
• AI9 — Trade him or not? 
• Mo Speights coming to life
• Thad’s January struggles
• Potential lineup changes

 Full podcast after the jump…

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There’s a school of thought in film criticism that a piece of cinema can be so bad, such a misfire on every possible level, that it can be understood as great.  The thinking, as I understand it, is that doing the complete opposite, in the most literal sense, of what every correct artistic impulse dictates demonstrates a genius-level ability to identify, intuitively or otherwise, the essential pivot-points in the machinery of cinema.  The director of such a film has created a sort of photonegative of greatness, which with a little imagination, can itself be appreciated as great.

Willie Green – the exquisitely, defiantly, relentlessly awful Willie Green– was, in his own way, just such a photonegative.  And now, mercifully, he’s gone.  And some part of me –a part of me lodged so deep in the recesses of my being that I can only access it when I listen to Depeche Mode – misses him.

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On August 11th Philadunkia’s home team hired Rod Thorn as President of Basketball Operations, effectively demoting Ed Stefanski.

At the time many people, including all of us here at Philadunkia, were asking is this a good move?

In an attempt to answer this larger question we have broken it down into its component parts:

Did Stefanski deserve the demotion?

Was Thorn the right hire?

And if not Thorn, who?

After the jump we take a stab at the first question and examine the Stefanski era.

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He’s certainly not a mega-star like Kobe Bryant, Lebron James, Dwyane Wade or even Kevin Durant and you could make a strong argument that he has failed to take that next step to all-star status, but heading into the future I believe Andre Iguodala is a key component for the Philadelphia 76ers and thus Ed Stefanski should not trade the Sixers wingman.

After giving him a contract extension at a total of $80 million over six years, the Sixers organization expected Iguodala to elevate his level of play and develop into elite player in the League.  To be honest it has not happened.

Of course Iguodala has not had much help either.  For starters, AI9 has played under four head coaches in the last six years – not exactly the stability a young player needs to grow and develop.  But hopefully Doug Collins brings an end to that stretch.

Additionally, the franchise has never been able to find him a right hand man.  The front office’s latest attempt was Elton Brand, who was thought to be the complimentary star to Iguodala’s inevitable superstar.  Upon his signing, the Sixers envisioned Brand as an interior scorer that would change opposing defensive schemes and thus free up Iguodala.  Unfortunately at this time, Brand is not the same player who commanded nightly double-teams before rupturing his Achilles tendon and has turned out to be one of the worst free agent signings in modern NBA history.

Still the coaching carousel and the Brand debacle only make up half of Iguodala’s lack of growth.  He has failed to significantly improve many parts of his game since his contract extension.  In fact, many feel as though he has regressed over the last two seasons.  

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As everyone in Philadunkia nation knows, tonight up in Secaucus, New Jersey the NBA will hold it’s annual Draft Lottery selection show.  The 76ers will have 53 chances out of the 1,001 possible combinations in tonight’s Draft Lottery.  They  can move up to one of the top three slots, remain sixth or slip as low as ninth, but that’s as far as they can fall on the 2010 NBA Draft lottery board. 

The Sixers have a 5.3% chance of winning the Lottery and grabbing the #1 spot which will give them the right to select Kentucky’s John Wall.  They stand a 6% chance at jumping up the board to the #2 slot where they will likely be over joyed at the opportunity to draft Ohio State shooting guard Evan Turner.  Finally, the Sixers own a 6.9% chance of moving up three spot to #3 which will give them a month to debate what they should do with that pick — draft a center, package the pick in a trade for a highly skilled two guard or blow it by drafting another ‘tweener forward. 

It’s plain to see from the numbers above that the Sixers chances of moving up the board tonight are not that great.  To be honest we would need some serious help.  Scratch that, we would nee a miracle to get inside the top two where we could draft a potential franchise changing player.  So while we think point guard Jrue Holiday, the future of the 76ers franchise, is a fine candidate to be representing the 76ers at tonight’s NBA Draft Lottery, we would like to suggest to Mr. Snider a few last minute substitutions for Holiday.  In our minds if any one of the following people were representing the Sixers tonight, then Phialdunkia’s home team would have a real chance to get the #1 or #2 pick in the 2010 NBA Draft.

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Right before the 76ers tipped off the 2009-10 season and promptly got throttled by the Orlando Magic in the opener – a sign of things to come this past year –, Philadunkia posted a unique preview of the 2009-10 season.  After all the changes that went on with the 76ers in summer 2009 and a 2009-10 preseason filled with remarkable highs and disturbing lows, many fans had no idea what to expect from the Sixers this past season, so we did our best to predict what to expect from Philadunkia’s home team in 2009-10.

We’ve been kicking around the idea of revisiting that “Preview” post since the season ended, but there’s been so many other things to write about that we haven’t had the opportunity to pull the piece together.  Well, we finally decided that today was the day to post something different from all the head coaching speculation and NBA Draft Lottery predictions that have surrounded the Sixers over the last few weeks. 

So today’s post is titled “Upon Further Review” (UFR) because we’re looking back at our 2009-10 76ers Preview and ripping our predictions to shreds or calling ourselves Nostradamus when warranted.

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As the 76ers ponder their weekend interview with head coaching candidate Doug Collins and Larry Brown ponders his potential future in Philadelphia, Sixers fans should take a moment to reflect as well. 

After another disappointing season, it seems only logical to scoop up the highly successful Brown and allow him to put us back onto the postseason path.  After all, Larry Brown has brought eight different teams into the NBA’s second season.  He is the only coach to boast both an NCAA and NBA title, and he led the Sixers to their most recent Finals appearance in 2001.  So considering the Sixers current standing, it would seem silly not to pursue a coach with such credentials. However, the decision is not as clear cut as it seems, and serious consideration is required by the Sixers brass and fans alike before bringing back the well-traveled teacher. 

Larry Brown is an excellent coach.  That is not up for debate.  He is even considered by some, such as franchise icon Allen Iverson, as “the best coach in the world;” a strong compliment coming from someone notorious for clashing with the coach in the past.  So, the questions surrounding the Sixers in this decision do not have to do with Larry’s credentials or coaching ability, but rather his commitment and whether he is the right fit for this young struggling squad.    

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Now that the ball is no longer bouncing at the Wachovia Center for the Philadelphia 76ers’ 2009-10 campaign, players have some free time to do things outside the basketball realm.  Recently Sixers forward Marreese Speights was at the Copabanana on South Street as a guest bartender in order to raise money for the Ronald McDonald house in Philadelphia.  Speights is possibly following in the footsteps of fellow teammate Samuel Dalembert who recently received the NBA’s J. Walter Kennedy Citizenship Award for helping out mightily with the relief effort in Haiti.

“Helping out with the Ronald McDonald house is a great feeling,” said Speights.  “I realized that it’s harder to serve drinks then I thought it was, but I’m doing my best to help out the children.”

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To start us off, here’s a bunch of links from the Larry Brown saga:

Yesterday at the Quail Hollow Championship (PGA Tournament) in Charlotte Michael Jordan was paired with veteran golf star Fred Couples during the Pro-Am.

On the ninth tee Charlotte Bobcats coach Larry Brown went inside the ropes, hugged everybody in the group and then hung with MJ and Freddy for the rest of the round.  To us that seems like pretty unusual behavior if LB is about to pack up shop and come home to Philly.

Dei Lynam at csnphilly.com wonders if LB could be headed to LA instead of Philly?

Phil Sheridan at the Inqy writes that the 76ers should simply walk away from this whole Larry Brown idea.  Which is something we agree with 100% (more on that later).

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Obviously the firing of Eddie Jordan is the big news over the last two days and boy does it feel good to finally write that line.   There are just too many articles out there we could link to regarding Jordan’s dismissal and we didn’t want this post to be two pages long, so in the interest of time we’ll just hit you with two of our favorite links regarding Jordan finally getting canned.

The first Eddie Jordan got fired link comes from Comcast SporstNet via CSNPhilly.com.  Numerous Sixers players were interviewed about Jordan’s dismissal and everyone passed on throwing EJ under the bus except Elton Brand and Thaddeus Young.  Both Brand and Young took some shots at Jordan.  Young apparently was never “comfortable” this year and felt his role was not defined enough for him to succeed.  Brand of course had issues with Jordan regarding his own playing time, but also with the lack of minutes for Jason Kapono.

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