Forget the Hype: Jaylen Brown and Tyrese Maxey Will Decide the Sixers’ Season

The hype is real for the 76ers. Tyrese Maxey, VJ Edgecombe, Jaylen Brown, LeBron James, and Joel Embiid make up one of the most talented starting fives in recent league history. When the Sixers open the regular season on Tuesday in New York City, they will do so with loftier expectations than any Sixers team in recent memory.

The talent alone isn’t the only storyline, though. Five players cannot all take 20 shots per night, and the two who are most likely to be affected most are the ones who carried the scoring load for their teams last season. The real storyline is how well Brown and Maxey adjust to their new roles. That alone may very well decide how far this team goes.

Maxey’s change is the easier one to envision, mostly because his skill set is the easiest to transition to his new role. He averaged a career-high 28.3 points last season and made All-NBA for the first time, but he closed the year saying he wanted to play off the ball again. This roster will finally allow him to do so. James, Brown, Embiid, and Edgecombe can all bring the ball up the floor, which frees Maxey to run off screens, get out in transition, and fire away on catch-and-shoot threes or use that opportunity to fake and streak. Opponents need to respect his three-point ability, since he hit at 41.8% last season. Maxey laid out the plan at media day on Sept. 28, and he did not sound like a star worried about his touches.

“So I think that is the opportunity that this roster presents: for me to play off the ball a little bit more, more catch-and-shoot,” Maxey said.

Brown’s transition will be the harder one. The five-time All-Star and 2024 Finals MVP built his reputation in Boston on creating his own shot, and the Sixers acquired him in July. He now joins a roster with more ball-handling options than he has ever played alongside, meaning fewer tough isolation looks in addition to a bigger share of the workload on defense. Brown has talked up defense as the thing this group should build its identity around, and head coach Nick Nurse’s plan for his offense is still one of the biggest early questions.

After his third practice on Oct. 1, Brown kept coming back to the same name, who has been the biggest help to him so far.

“Tyrese, he’s just been a great communicator,” Brown said. “He’s been leading on the court early on. He’s gone out of his way to make sure that I feel comfortable in the system, which goes a long way.”

Edgecombe sits in the middle of it all. The 21-year-old finished third in Rookie of the Year voting after averaging 16.0 points, 5.6 rebounds and 4.2 assists, and now, he becomes the fifth option in a lineup that won’t need him to hunt shots. That is where he can learn the most from a future first-ballot Hall of Famer in James.

The cleanup list in Edgecombe’s game is short and mostly about shooting. Edgecombe made 35.4% of his threes last season, including 38.3% on catch-and-shoot attempts but only 31.4% on pull-ups. What stood out the most, however, was that he went 0-for-6 from deep in the Sixers’ game-four loss to the Knicks in the second round. Nearly all of his looks this year will be catch-and-shoot chances created by defenses collapsing on James and Brown, so the key is reading the floor before the ball arrives.

That is the most useful thing that he can take from James, whose game has always been all about processing speed. What has kept him elite this late into his career is that he sees the defense shift a beat early and decides to shoot, drive, or pass the ball before the closeout gets there. Nurse has called James a great creator and table-setter, and Edgecombe is the teammate best positioned to cash in on it. James, for his part, does not think the new pecking order should shrink Edgecombe’s role.

“I’ve been hearing things are going to change for him. I don’t understand why things would change for him,” James said. “I think with his dynamic, him being able to get out in transition, attack defenses before defenses set, his ability in the half-court situation where we’re able to attract multiple eyes, and he’s able to catch it on a catch-and-go or against an off-balance defense. I don’t think his role should change.”

Nurse has said it will take time to iron out roles in the starting lineup, and the Sixers are planning to manage the workloads of both James and Embiid carefully. That will leave Maxey, Brown, and Edgecombe with plenty of chances to shine. If Maxey thrives off the ball, Brown accepts a smaller piece of the offense, and Edgecombe tightens up his shot selection, the Sixers will have a team that won’t be reliant on a fragile big or an aging legend.

If Maxey thrives off the ball, Brown embraces a smaller scoring role, and Edgecombe becomes more consistent from three, Philadelphia won’t need Embiid or James to carry the team every night. That matters more than anything in October because the Sixers need these five players to figure out how to win together before the playoffs arrive.

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