ESPN’s Mark Jones credits Bryan Colangelo more than Sam Hinkie for 76ers’ success

Mark Jones handled the play-by-play on ESPN's broadcast of the Rockets 123-118 victory over the Sixers Friday night at the Wells Fargo Center, alongside color analyst P.J. Carlesimo.

Before heading to the Wells Fargo Center on Friday morning, Jones chatted for a few minutes about the 76ers' rapid rise to prominence with Joel Embiid, which led ESPN to bump the Heat-Bulls game off its schedule for 76ers-Rockets.

How big are the 76ers as a national story right now?

I would think they're the biggest reclamation and restoration story of the year so far. I think when you look at how they've been a punchline for the last 3 1/2  years before this, what Joel Embiid has done nationally to restore their reputation - not just with his play, but with his outsize personality - that has really helped the cause a great deal.

And the way that the Colangelos in the front office, Bryan in particular, has laid the foundation for things going forward, they're in a good place right now.

There are some people in this town who would say the foundation was laid before the Colangelos got here.

Yes, that's a valid argument, but at some point, I think you accumulate enough assets to start winning. I don't think you need to hoard three years' worth of assets to start making the move.

I'm not a big fan of tanking, because ultimately along the way you're teaching losing; you're not teaching winning. I think the previous administration, Sam Hinkie, I think they probably took that a little far, a little extreme.

The way the NBA is set up, though, don't you have to be that bad to ultimately be that good? That's certainly what Hinkie's defenders have said.

I don't think you do. I think you've got to be shrewd enough to find under-valued free agents, maybe overpay a little bit to get them at times. I think you've got to be shrewd and discerning in finding second-round picks, the Malcolm Brogdons [of the Milwaukee Bucks], and I think you can do it without doing a total tank job. I really do.

Because even now, they're doing well - 17 wins, Embiid, Simmons, Noel, Okafor, some great young pieces - but that doesn't guarantee anything. You're not guaranteed anything for another few years.

Which is why the 76ers are hoping they finally get the Lakers' high first-round pick if L.A. finishes outside the top three in this year's lottery.

Yeah, I mean, the operative word there is hope, though. It may not happen.

[Though if it doesn't this year, it comes to the 76ers in 2018 no matter what. - J.T.]

There was some sense of what Joel Embiid could be when he was drafted, but since he was out injured for two full seasons, did you think he would become as great a pro as he is right now?

I remember seeing Embiid at Kansas as a freshman, walking in the gym. I don't get into a lot of college basketball hype -- I just walk in the gym and see who can play and who can't. He, along with [Andrew] Wiggins and Wayne Selden Jr. - they had a whole bunch of kids in the gym, and Embiid was the best player on the floor.

I live in South Florida, and I had seen him play at the Rock School [his high school in Gainesville, Fla.]. He had talent and skill and finesse for a guy that size. But any time you deal with bigs with foot problems - I've worked with one, Bill Walton, for a few years - there's always that big, lingering question mark. Then the back injury right before the draft.

It was a gamble. But you could certainly see that he had major, major talent. But like my good friend Hubie Brown says, talent's not any good if you can't play because you're not available.

What do you make of Ben Simmons at this point? We saw glimpses of him in the summer league, and the hope clearly is that he'll soon be dealing passes to Joel Embiid for lots of points.

Coach [Brett] Brown told me that he's going to use him as a point forward. He'll become the Sixers' version of LeBron [James], because LeBron is the Cavaliers' de facto point guard. It will work. I can definitely see it working. I did a bunch of his games at LSU, and he has a great handle, great vision.

The wild card is going to be his willingness to shoot the basketball. Coach Brown said, "When he gets available, I've got to convince him it's okay to shoot, and shoot frequently - and it's okay to miss, and miss frequently. Because he has to become a threat."

If he's your de facto point and Embiid's your 5, you're strong at the 1 and the 5. That's a fantastic start.

Lots of people have talked about the parallels between Simmons and LeBron, and the relationship that they already have. It's interesting that you mention Simmons needing to want to shoot, because for as much as LeBron scores, that was a criticism of him at one point too. Is that another common thing with the two of them?

That's the guy that he's modeled his game after, Simmons. From top to bottom. And that, I think, is going to be a learning curve for him. A pretty steep one at times, because in the NBA, if you've got a little weakness, it will become a glaring weakness in no time.

Teams will start going under on screen-and-rolls, they won't play him to shoot, and they'll expose him if he doesn't want to shoot it. He's going to have to want to shoot it so he becomes a better shooter.

When ESPN picked up this game, there was immediately a lot of speculation that it might be Simmons' debut. Brett Brown shot it down pretty quickly, but was there ever any sense on your part that it might actually happen?

We were hoping too, man. But he's a ways away, and if he comes back after the All-Star break that would be great. With a potentially transcendent talent like that, you don't take chances. Especially with foot injuries with bigs. There's a litany of guys that have come back too soon. And especially with this franchise, going through what they went through with Embiid, you want to be careful.

I was here for the Lakers-Sixers game in mid-December, and there was a reason that one was on the schedule, too: We were anticipating it being Simmons and [Brandon] Ingram, the No. 1 and 2 picks. The basketball gods have a weird sense of humor sometimes.

The 76ers are widely regarded as one of the great franchises in NBA history, and there are plenty of good reasons for that. Yet they don't actually have that many championships - and in a lot of seasons since the '90s, they've had a lot of really bad teams. Many younger 76ers fans saw the team win regularly only when Allen Iverson was here, and even then, that team won only one division title. 

How big a deal for the NBA would it be if the Embiid-Simmons team becomes really successful?

It would be great for the NBA if Philadelphia became one of the prominent teams again, one of the dominant teams in the NBA. You mentioned the tradition here. The classic NBA Sunday matchups back in the day, with Dick Stockton and Brent Musburger calling 76ers-Celtics games. At one point, it seemed like those were the only two teams on television.

Philadelphia has a certain basketball charm about it that's unique to itself, that's indigenous. When you walk around here, still, there are echoes. They might be a little faint, but I walked in the arena a couple of weeks ago when I did the Lakers-76ers game, and talked to World B. Free and saw some former Sixers around. I don't think they're that far off, and I think it would be fantastic to have Philly as a major player.