Ben Simmons and the Sixers show their true colors in their first big Eastern Conference test | David Murphy

Are they the rabbit or the duck? The young lady or the old woman? The beach or the busted car door? The purple and black dress or whatever one it is that the weird people see?

The way this is supposed to work is that the Sixers play a big game against one of their biggest impediments to the NBA Finals, and within the framework of that game they reveal some larger truth about themselves that folks like myself can then expound upon for 800 words. But, more often than not, the way it actually works is the way it worked at the Wells Fargo Center on Wednesday night. For two quarters, they look exactly like the team they are going to need to be to make a playoff run with the current cast. And then, for the next two quarters, they look exactly like the team they could easily be en route to an early postseason exit.

» READ MORE: Sixers fall to Milwaukee Bucks, 109-105, in overtime

In short, this is not a team built for sweeping generalizations requiring 800 words or less. The Sixers’ good qualities are so good that you can talk yourself into believing that they might end up trumping the bad ones. And their bad qualities are so bad that you can’t help but wonder how they can possibly consider themselves a contender.

On Wednesday, this was the first half and then the second. At the end of overtime, you were left with a 109-105 loss that left us sitting where we had started.

“I don’t leave this game discouraged,” the head coach said afterward. “Let me put it that way.”

» READ MORE: Sixers coach Doc Rivers speaks out against rise of violence and discrimination toward Asian Americans

Really, that’s the only way he could put it. But there’s a maxim that’s applicable in both politics and coach-speak that says the real truth lies in the invocation of the double negative. Throughout his postgame media briefing, Doc Rivers sounded like most Sixers fans felt. Bewildered, emotionally torn, in need of a bottle of low-grade whiskey. He struggled to find complete sentences that described what he saw. Probably because this was a game that defied them.

For two quarters, the Sixers were a sweltering team that played in the image of their one star who is healthy. The first half was Ben Simmons’ half, and the fact that the Sixers finished it with a mere 45 points seemed all the more emblematic of where his value lies. The next time his detractors insist that a star must shoot, must finish, must SCORE like a superman to be worth his hype, here were two quarters you could direct them to watch.

He finished them with a measly four points on 2-for-8 shooting. Three of his six misses came at the rim. On several occasions, when he was on the attack, he looked like the player his critics hold him to be: passive, uninventive, off balance, lacking the elite finishing ability that his build suggests. And, yet, the Sixers entered the half up 14.

They held that lead because of the things Simmons does, the things that impact outcomes just as thoroughly as putting the ball in the bucket. There he was, fronting Giannis Antetokounmpo and forcing an errant pass. There he was, tossing a left-handed, behind-the-back pass to the corner for an open Furkan Korkmaz. There he was, burying an undersized defender beneath the basket in transition. There he was, extending an arm into Bobby Portis’ shooting radius to force an unnaturally high, arcing brick.

The mistake that Simmons’ critics make is that they define him by his flaws. It’s an understandable mistake, given how rectifiable his shortcomings can seem to the naked eye. The NBA is a league in which most possessions end in buckets, and, thus, our attention is most often drawn to players whose chief ability is scoring those buckets. You watch the wizardry of young up-and-comers such as Luka Doncic and Trae Young and Zach LaVine and you wish the Sixers had a player who could do the same type of things. At which point, you should look at the standings and wonder why each of those players plays for a .500 team.

At least, until you looked at the Bucks outscore the Sixers by 78-60 in the second half and overtime.

» READ MORE: Three reasons the Sixers lost in OT to Milwaukee

The end result was only Simmons’ fault if you want him to be something he is not. But, at the same time, what he is not was something the Sixers desperately needed. Turned out, those 45 points were an omen, and it came to fruition in shell-shocking fashion. The Bucks started making their shots, the Sixers never did, and they simply could not get to the basket. Simmons finished with 16 points on 6-for-16 shooting, and nobody else came close to picking up the slack. It’s fair to wonder how different it would have been with Joel Embiid healthy, but this team hasn’t exactly avoided these same struggles with him.

If the Sixers can put together four quarters like the first two against the Bucks, sure, that works. But that’s a tall task when the road to the Finals includes a team that features James Harden, Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving.

At some point, the Sixers are going to need to be able to consistently create buckets in the half-court with somebody other than Embiid. Add a player capable of manufacturing such offense, and Wednesday night would have looked radically different.

Is that a positive takeaway or a negative one? I suppose it depends on what happens before the March 25 trade deadline. Until then, you can rest easy knowing that we still don’t know anything at all.