As the 2019-20 NBA season gets set to resume on July 30th in Orlando, TNT NBA analyst Kenny Smith believes the Philadelphia 76ers have a chance to "win it all."
Related: Larry Brown on Simmons, Embiid and 76ers' real issue
"I think that this is a new season," Smith told the 94WIP Morning Show on Monday. "Don't make no mistake about it, think of both Embiid and Simmons in their next year of the NBA. How are they going to look? And now you say, this is a different team and they have an opportunity to win it all. They have all the talent around them, they have a great opportunity, and they have a chance to win it all."
Smith explained that we should treat this second half of the 2019-20 season as a completely new season, essentially meaning that when play resumes Joel Embiid will be in his fifth season and Ben Simmons will be in his fourth, rather than seasons four and three respectively.
"I don't think you view them as when they left," Smith explained. "I don't think any team you view as that. I think that you are going to see -- usually we say, teams are made in the Summer. Players are made, because you get a chance to work on your game individually. Here you have three and a half months off, so the young guys on that team now have gone through the season and have come back three months later. They have a different perception about what the league is. So I think you'll see a jump in Joel Embiid, I think you'll see a jump in Ben Simmons, I think you'll see a jump in a lot of the younger players because this was like a Summer off and coming back into your next year. So, there's no rookies on this team. This is jumping back into a new season with new ideas and you're gonna go, 'I really didn't think this guy was that good.'"
The Sixers have the sixth shortest odds to win the NBA Championship at 22-1.
Obviously, the world is still dealing with COVID-19 and the resumption of pro sports is far from guaranteed.
"I'm cautious in the fact that I'm hoping that we (the NBA) can create some guidelines that everyone can follow," Smith said.
Smith's co-hosts and fellow former NBA players, Charles Barkley and Shaq, have been critical of Embiid over the last couple of seasons. Here's what Barkley said in December, giving the Sixers "no chance."
"(Embiid is) the toughest player in the league to match up with, but we don't talk about him the way we talk about Luka (Doncic), Giannis (Antetokounmpo), Anthony Davis, James (Harden) — we don't ever say that about him," Barkley said. "It's frustrating for me, because I picked the Sixers to get to the Finals. They ain't go no chance.
