For the second consecutive postseason, Philadelphia 76ers’ head coach Brett Brown has ratcheted up his team’s pick-and-roll frequency. Last year, with Jimmy Butler in tow, Brown shifted Ben Simmons off the ball and let the star acquisition operate how he pleased. This year, Butler is gone and Simmons is sidelined, so those sequences have been portioned primarily toward Tobias Harris, Josh Richardson and Alec Burks instead. Over the past two seasons, Philadelphia has upped its ball-screen volume from 15 percent to 18.7 percent (2018-19) and 18.3 percent to 25.2 percent (2019-20) during the playoffs. The ripple effect of this transition is Joel Embiid assuming greater duties as a roll man — evidently clear during the late stages of Game 1.
The Sixers are running lots of pick-and-rolls. What does that mean for Joel Embiid?
