 Quality Practice and The Jazz First, check out this story from Kate Fagen. This passage is music to my ears:When the 76ers walked onto their practice court on Sunday morning, they had to laugh. That is an awesome way to accomplish exactly what we talked about yesterday. Let's hope we see immediate results tonight. After the jump we'll dive into tonight's match-up with the Utah Jazz. For my preview of tonight's game, I was all set to focus on who would defend Mehmet Okur. The big Turk is a huge match-up problem for the Sixers, much like Rashard Lewis, because his range extends all the way out beyond the three-point line. Neither Dalembert nor Brand, so far, is adept at guarding bigs that far away from the hoop. Rasheed Wallace will present a similar problem, when they face the Pistons. Unfortunately, Okur had to fly back to Turkey to visit a sick relative and he'll miss the game. This should work to the Sixers advantage, but you hate to see something like that happen. Also missing from Utah's starting lineup is their stud point guard, Deron Williams. Williams hasn't played a game yet this season due to an ankle injury, which was exacerbated earlier this week when the aforementioned Okur fell on it during practice. The Sixers will have had 4 days of preparation and rest to get ready to face this lineup:
Korver may find his way into the starting lineup if Jerry Sloan is feeling nostalgic. The point is, the Jazz have no size whatsoever. The only active size they're going to have on the bench are Kosta Koufos and Kyrylo Fesenko, two seven footers who have comined for 11 minutes and 2 points in the team's first 6 games. Elton Brand should absolutely own this game. Boozer isn't the type of guy who can shut him down and they aren't going to be able to double with any kind of size. He should have his way with them on the low blocks and hopefully all that practice will pay off. There are two things I'm really looking forward to from a strategy standpoint:
 The tip is at 7 p.m. My wrap will be up after the Sixers win. 
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You know that Brand has broken 20 once, shot 50 percent or higher from the field just once as well (same game, against the Knicks joke of an interior defense), and turned the ball over three times or more in every game but one? I think he's right up there with Iguodala and Miller in disappointment.
Right now the sixers are a very bad team. They are going to lose that game tomorrow too...
nice 2-6 start. So far they beat two teams that are clearly rebuilding and have gotten outplayed badly in every other game as well as blowing a 23 point second half lead. We could use the "they just have to get used to each other" excuse. Hmm...lets see...the celtics swapped out almost their whole DAMN team last year and they didnt seem to have any issues. Every team every year has new players and they figure it out. This is going to get really ugly really fast. Its a long season and all but if you watch the sixers games you can clearly see their parts really dont fit together. Not sure what else to say on it...
Well Garnett's a leader, you know; Brand's not really the type to get Iguodala's head on straight. And it's hard when he's playing indifferently himself. The solution will have to come from the coaching staff, there's no one on this team who's going to motivate everybody to get their act together.
Agreed it's going to have to come from the coaching staff, although I disagree that Brand's playing indifferently. He's getting zero help on the offensive side of the ball, everywhere else he's been better than advertised.
Fair enough; he does play defense, but our problems are offense and turnovers, and he hasn't been that great in either regard.
Yup, he has to shoulder some of the blame, but take a look at my post from tonight. He's basically on an island against a double team every time he touches the ball in the post. Not many guys would be putting up numbers like that without some help from their team. I'm not talking about hitting open jumpers either. I'm talking about giving him a clear option to pass out of the double.
Yeah, bad spacing, not many shooters to pass to... but, you know, Duncan put up 23 tonight on 11-17 shooting and his starting backcourt was Roger Mason Jr. and George Hill. Then again, he was playing the Knicks. I just don't see Brand looking like a dynamite post player right now. He doesn't just outmuscle everyone like Boozer, he's not a man of a million moves like Jefferson, he's not quite athletic enough that his height isn't something of a disadvantage against bigger fours - oh, and his mid-range jump shot is good, but not Webber-in-his-prime good, or even Boozer good. I do feel like he's not quite the same guy he was before the injury, and I'd be very unsurprised if this year he's just an 18 and 10 guy, 49% shooting, 1.5 bpg.