Tyrese Maxey has been a paradise for the Philadelphia 76ers this season. He may still have plenty of flaws in his game, but there’s little doubt that he’s the main reason the team is even touting a winning record at the time of writing, despite being bitten hard by the proverbial injury bug. The six-year guard has emerged as one of the best players in the league in the current campaign, but there is one asterisk everyone should look out for in him.
Not many people have talked about the workload the 76ers have placed on their superstar, but it certainly deserves some thought. Maxey leads the league in minutes per game with 39.2 minutes per night, which is almost two full minutes more than the second player on the list. To emphasize how much mileage he’s racked up so far, he’s averaging the most minutes the league has ever seen 15 years – yes, you read that right.
No one in the NBA has averaged more minutes this season than Maxey has since Luol Deng did so in the lockout-shortened 2011-12 season. That’s certainly a piece of history for the 76ers to stumble upon, but it’s something no other team would want right now.
The 76ers have made unwanted history by asking too much of Tyrese Maxey
As good as Maxey is, no player in the modern era should get anywhere near the minutes he gets every night. Nick Nurse and the entire coaching staff are essentially asking too much of their All-Star, and at some point this unwanted status quo must come to an end.
Maxey has never really been an injury-prone player, but since last season he has missed a few games from time to time due to various nagging injuries. That’s likely a sign that his mileage is catching up to him to some extent, and the 76ers’ brain trust should lean more on those signals.
Given the speed of the game where players navigate the floor much faster and with greater amplitude, it is untenable to continue playing Maxey for almost the entire game. The 76ers, for example, don’t have the necessary backcourt depth to afford to lose him to injury. And almost counter-intuitively, keeping the minutes at the guard positions so locked up for Maxey and VJ Edgecombe is poor lineup optimization.
Sooner or later, the 76ers will reel from the consequences of having to play Tyrese Maxey for so many minutes. They can only hope that when the games start to matter more, the All-Star guard will still be in one piece. Otherwise, the direct recipient of the debt should be easy to locate.
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