CAMDEN, N.J. — A year ago, the Philadelphia 76ers crafted what they thought was a clever contingency.

Joel Embiid wouldn’t play all 82 games, certainly. But he’d be good enough that the games he’d miss wouldn’t matter so much, and anyway the 76ers could scrape together wins here and there via defense and a faster pace of play. How that would happen was, well a bit of hand-waving and magical thinking.

In September, with the sting of how that hubris cratered still fresh, Tyrese Maxey took to the podium and made the most declarative statement of media day. The 76ers would develop an identity that didn’t depend on his or Embiid’s or anyone else’s nightly availability. The Sixers, as an organization, would play a certain way, no matter who was in uniform.

That commandment has guided the pres

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