Injuries are already taking their toll on the Philadelphia 76ers

The Philadelphia 76ers had a dream offseason, landing Jaylen Brown via trade and signing LeBron James to a minimum contract. But their preseason got off to a nightmarish start Monday, as backup center Ariel Hukporti suffered a season-ending Achilles tear midway through the first quarter.

That wasn’t the only health-related concern that popped up for the Sixers in recent days, either. Earlier on Monday, ESPN’s Dave McMenamin mentioned that LeBron has “chronic arthritis” in his left foot that requires “special attention” from his athletic trainer.

LeBron didn’t play in the Sixers’ preseason opener, but he’s been all systems go at training camp. It doesn’t sound as though he’s in danger of missing time at the start of the year. But it’s also unrealistic to expect the soon-to-be 42-year-old to play all 82 regular-season games or average 35-plus minutes per game.

That’s less of a concern for the Sixers than Hukporti’s injury for now.

The Sixers’ backup center issues

The Sixers are hard-capped at the $209.0 million first apron, which means they cannot cross that line under any circumstance this season. They currently sit only $1.8 million below it, which is a major issue when it comes to replacing Hukporti.

A standard one-year, veteran-minimum contract for anyone with two or more years of NBA experience costs $2.45 million before the start of the season. Even someone with one year of NBA experience would come with a $2.2 million cap hit. If the Sixers wanted to sign someone now, they’d have to either waive Jabari Walker, who only has $250,000 of his $2.6 million contract guaranteed, dump salary in a trade or sign an undrafted free-agent rookie.

Minimum contracts do begin to prorate downward by roughly $14,000 per day once the regular season begins, so the Sixers should have enough wiggle room under the first apron to fill their open roster spot by the first week of December. Until then, they might have to get creative when it comes to finding a Hukporti replacement.

The easiest solution would be filling their last open two-way spot with a center. They might spend the next few weeks seeing how training camp battles play out across the league and which players might shake loose from other teams before handing out that last two-way deal. But at this point, it would be shocking if they didn’t fill that spot with a big man.

For now, they’ll have to go with a patchwork option. Head coach Nick Nurse told reporters Wednesday that backup center Adem Bona (foot) and reserve forward Dominick Barlow (back) will each miss the next two preseason games, although neither injury sounds particularly serious for now. That’s going to force Nurse to experiment with more small-ball 5 looks behind Joel Embiid.

As much as the national media might try to gaslight everyone into thinking the Sixers’ biggest issue this year revolves around who the “alpha” of the team is, their actual biggest issue is health. Always has been in the Embiid era, always will be, particularly in the wake of Hukporti’s injury.

In previous years, the Sixers only went as far as Embiid could drag them, but he could never make it through a playoff run healthy. They’ve already begun to pivot away from being so Embiid-centric—and the additions of Brown and LeBron should only further accelerate that—but they’ll still need the big fella to man the middle on defense, even if he’s no longer their offensive focal point.

During Nurse’s three years in Philly thus far, the Sixers have yet to finish in the top 20 leaguewide in total rebound percentage. Given their personnel, they should be a nightmare to defend in transition this season, but they can’t get out in transition without first pulling down rebounds. (As LeBron put it on Mind the Game, “As fast and athletic as we can be, we can’t do shit if we don’t get the rebound.”)

Even though the Sixers’ depth chart behind Embiid is lacking for now, they still have plenty of size between Bona (6 foot 10), James (6 foot 9), Barlow (6 foot 9), Dean Wade (6 foot 9) and Jabari Walker (6 foot 7). Gang-rebounding may be their interim solution to their backup center problem. Rim protection is another story entirely.

If nothing else, the Hukporti injury served as a harsh reminder about the Sixers’ actual biggest concern this season. Apologies to the “there’s only one ball” crowd for briefly depriving them of a talking point.