Star Power

It may take the 76ers a decade to recover.

by E. James Beale

Last year, if you wanted to see Ohio State University junior guard Evan Turner's stat-line, you could simply queue up the "team leaders" section of OSU's website: Turner's 20.4 points, 6.0 assists, 1.7 steals and — despite playing the majority of his minutes at point guard — 9.2 rebounds per game all led his team, and his .9 blocks per game were second. He led the Buckeyes to a No. 2 seed in the NCAA tournament, and — considering the team was 26-5 with him in the lineup and 3-3 without — it is not a stretch to say he did it alone.

There are more NBA teams than not that, if they had the second pick in last month's draft, should have selected Turner. Unfortunately, none of those teams were the 76ers, who did own the second pick, and who didn't pass.

It may take the franchise a decade to recover.

It's not that Turner isn't talented; he is. His ability to both play and defend three NBA positions is really valuable. His worst-case scenario is a post-injury Grant Hill. That's a really high floor.

Unfortunately, his ceiling is also low. For all of Turner's talents, he lacks the physical gifts that the NBA's elite have: He has short arms (despite being slightly taller than Xavier Henry, the other shooting guard selected in the draft's lottery, Turner's wingspan is more than 3 inches shorter) and average jumping ability. Since 2001, the first year NBA draft combine stats are readily available, the complete list of All-Star shooting guards with wingspan/vertical jump measurements at or below Turner's contains exactly one name: Mike Redd. Redd earned his All-Star berth with one of the prettiest jump shots the league has ever seen — something Turner does not have.

Turner's backers explain this away by comparing Turner to Brandon Roy, another alligator-armed shooting guard who relies on craft and guile to get his points. What's unmentioned in this analysis is that Roy's max vert at the combine was a full 7 inches higher than Turner's, which allows him to get easy buckets, as well as contested ones. Turner doesn't have that luxury. He isn't a bad athlete — he's an average one, by NBA standards. Average athletes do not emerge as superstars.

For the 76ers, who lack a superstar, that is a problem. In the NBA, stars win. If you ignore the Detroit Pistons, you have to track back to the 1978-79 Seattle Supersonics before you find a NBA title winner without a current, future or former MVP in its starting lineup. Worse, both of the other viable directions the 76ers could have moved in — Georgia Tech big man Derrick Favors or Kentucky center DeMarcus Cousins — would have netted the 76ers a player who could be that star.

Favors, whose measurables compare to a young Dwight Howard, will never have his athleticism called into question. He works hard on defense and understands the game's fundamentals. If Jrue Holiday and Favors are your point guard and center, even Eddie Jordan couldn't make your team bad on D. DeMarcus Cousins, who went fifth to the Sacramento Kings, has star potential, as well. He is the rare giant who knows how to pass (scouts drool over his ability to split a double team) and rebound (his 17.4 rebounds per 40 game minutes led the NCAA).

Both Favors and Cousins have considerable downsides. Favors is raw (read: bad) on offense, and the list of physical freaks drafted for their athleticism includes not only guys like Howard, but also Kwame Brown. And Cousins is a crazy person. If you had to bet your life on someone from the Turner-Favors-Cousins triumvirate playing NBA basketball in 10 years, you'd pick Turner a thousand times out of a thousand.

Counterintuitively, this is actually another strike against Turner, at least as far as the 76ers are concerned. Remember those stars who win championships? There are two ways to get them: You either sign one — a process that requires ample cap space, creative management and something that makes your city an attractive destination, or you draft them, a process that requires a lot of losing. If the 76ers took a risk, they would not only have the shot at the payoff being great — a true superstar — but also the benefits of spectacular failure: namely, another shot at someone who can be great.

Evan Turner will be good. Not great, not terrible, but good. And so will his new team: Welcome to another decade of fifth to eighth seeds in the East.

E. James Beale reaps the benefits of spectacular failure. E-mail him at e.james.beale@citypaper.net.