Tony Cutillo
Brett Brown is becoming known for his up front personality and straightforward style of answering when it comes to the questions of the people. We know the situation and are very familiar with the task at hand for Brown. However, when Bryan Colangelo was seemingly hand-picked by the political department of the NBA, some thought Brown’s days were numbered. No one can blame those for that train of thought as it was predicated on the past and how history seems to always repeat itself in the NBA. Fortunately for Brown, he was given the torch to lead with only his own breath to blow it out.
On his second stint on The Vertical Podcast, this time with Woj, and Brown opened up about the interesting developments throughout the course of the season and the last four years as a whole. He brought his own “Process” to The Vertical and left the podcast enjoying his profound explanations. Below is just a sample of the information he shared.
RELATED: Brett Brown Discusses Ben Simmons and the Sixers’ New Expectations
Touching back on the above notion of Brown potentially being relieved of his duties once the Sam Hinkie resignation took place, the Sixers’ head coach was asked about how it is to work under Colangelo. He opened up and said he really never knew much about Colangelo, but came away impressed with his body of work once he took the top spot.
“He lets me coach and has been integral in letting me form my own staff. He enhances what I teach and gives me what I need to play it out on the floor.”
After talking about Colangelo, Wojnarowski dove right into the losing factor and asked for Brown’s feelings on “The Process” itself and how or if it impacted his coaching style. In his experiences as a head coach for 18 years leading up to the point where he became Pop’s right hand man, Brown admitted that losing doesn’t deter him away from the big picture. As a 56-year-old man, he breathes patience and doesn’t get unsettled easily. This is a huge factor in a solid foundation of player development and positive performance.
“I’m not concerned about my record. I’m not concerned how I will be judged. I feel no deterioration in my competitiveness.”
Later on in the interview, Woj hit Brown with a few questions about expectations going into this season and how/if that changed once Joel Embiid was able to suit up. His theory and expectations for this team is to be a top 15 defense each and every year. With this statistic in their back pocket, Brown believes a mindset of a playoff caliber team coincides with the accomplishment. When Embiid suited up and was finally cleared to play, top 15 began to look like top 5.
“He is the reason why we did what we did. He’s the Crown Jewel!”
We all know Embiid is the man wheel on the vehicle moving forward, but all others have to align as well. As we look forward, the Sixers do have Dario Saric, T.J. McConnell, and Robert Covington as the alignment needed to shutdown opposing teams in and outside the paint.
Just as Embiid inspires the defense, the offensive side of the ball will be in the hands of Ben Simmons. As soon as he was cleared to resume five-on-five activities, the questioning of positioning began to fill every newspaper space and website enhancement all across the land of the NBA. Is he the next Magic Johnson? Will he play the point?
“It is undeniable that — and I see it with my own son — when the ball goes in a basket or whatever, you know, when you look at young players, there’s always two or three people who come back who want to be the point guard. He’s done that his whole life. He wants the ball, and he has a complete passion to pass. So if you just take those two qualities, and forget how big he is, then you say well the starting point is interesting if you wanna try to say, “well, you’re a point guard.” Because all of a sudden somebody else comes in and says, “well now he’s 6’10”.” It gives people pause. If we said he had those qualities and he’s 6’4”, you might not think too much about if he’s a point guard or not. So that I feel that it would be not wise if we don’t consider him to be that, and I’m committed to trying this.”
I think this is already information we may have been able to gather ourselves, but it is certainly nice to hear it from the frontline and the head coach himself.
Brown continues to surprise all the naysayers that said he couldn’t do the job. I, for one, was on a radio program back in October and adamantly asked for his release. My reasoning was based on the same mistakes we were seeing in the games and the lack of production from the players who we knew should be scoring by accident. However, as soon as the Sixers bought in to what Brown was selling and began swinging the ball around like a poor man’s version of the San Antonio Spurs, I realized my thoughts may have gotten ahead of me. With that I will make sure to send Mr. Brown a Christmas card and ask for forgiveness.
This podcast goes on for about 50 minutes to include all of the thinking behind Brown’s decisions. The interesting tidbits that includes him knowing Simmons’ parents before marriage and following the game of Australian basketball show the intelligent breed of coaching he has to offer.
You can listen to it here and come up with your own conclusions. When you do, I want to hear from you so you can share what you think!
As always you can stop by my Facebook page (FantasySportsAddiction) or tweet me (@TCutillo23) for questions or some nice fantasy debates. I can also be heard weekly via the internet stream live at WengRadio every Monday at 4:00pm EST for a weekend sports wrap. But most importantly, you can catch me here at Pi!
Follow Philly Influencer on Twitter (@PHL_Influencer), Facebook and Instagram.