
Sports have become woven into American society; they are a part of the culture. Names like Babe Ruth, Michael Jordan, and Tom Brady have become more recognizable in American society than most of the country’s former presidents.  Fans are passionate about their sports teams, feeling the sting of every loss and the high of every win as if they themselves were players.  These types of emotions are the backbone of the highly profitable world of professional sports.  But what happens when a man challenges these ideals of winning, by purposefully losing.  Sam Hinkie is the answer to this question, during his time as the GM in Philadelphia the Sixer’s boasted a record of 51-195, which included the Sixer’s falling one game short of breaking the NBA’s all-time loss record by going 10-72 during the 2015-2016 NBA season.  That nearly record breaking season became Hinkie’s last stand as he “resigned” in April of 2016.  Hinkie lost a lot of basketball games but in doing so injected hope into a franchise that could use it. Sam Hinkie brought a “Process” to the table- infused with analytics and an extremely intellectually based forward-thinking approach, the Sixer’s former GM completely challenged every traditional ideal instilled in the NBA and he lost his job for it, and it might’ve worked.  

Professional sports connect its surrounding community, when fans gather from all over the area to root for the same team, it creates a sense of togetherness. What better city to represent this type of local togetherness, then the city of Brotherly Love, Philadelphia.  Philadelphia has always had a tough time winning sports championships, in the modern era of sports and sport’s media coverage it’s kind of been their thing, with only one mere championship to boast about in the last 37 years , it’s been a rough going for the city’s passionate fan base. Philadelphia’s tendency to remain hopeful despite the city’s track record has slowly created a culture of anger and impatience throughout the city’s fan base. Many Philadelphians have been waiting their whole life for their version of Michael Jordan, a player that would carry them to the promise land, to championships.  They were not however waiting for Samuel J. Hinkie.

Sam Hinkie was brought into Philadelphia after the team’s 2012-2013 season to be the GM of the city’s basketball team. Hinkie came to the city with a plan, a plan that involved both patience and trust, two things Philadelphians usually don’t have with their teams’ respective front offices. However, Hinkie was different, a self-proclaimed man with a plan, a new plan that the NBA has never really seen before. A plan that made sense to many on a rational level, but remained conflicting on an emotional one.  Hinkie’s plan, later dubbed “The Process”, was fundamentally rooted in losing, a lot.  Hinkie acquired a Sixer’s team who were described by many as “mediocre”. (Torre) A team that in the year previously traded a large part of their roster for a superstar center in Andrew Bynum, a player that many believed would be able to take the Sixer’s over the top before suffering an injury while bowling, sidelining not only the Sixer’s season, but the rest of his NBA career. (Torre) The trade that returned the Sixer’s a center who would never play a game of basketball for the team costed them Once attaining the Sixer’s roster, Hinkie began to address the team’s major problem, its lack of talent.  

Hinkie kicked things off by trading the team’s starting Point guard, Jrue Holiday, to the New Orleans Pelicans in return for rookie Nerlens Noel.  Hinkie then drafted Elfrid Payton, whom he knew that the Magic, the team drafting after them desperately wanted. (Honksalo) Magic then drafted Dario Saric, who had stated he was not coming over from his Turkish league team to the NBA for two years. (Honksalo) The Sixers in turn swapped draft choices with the Magic to throw in another First rounder as well. (Honksalo) That was the 2015 draft, Dario Saric is now the favorite for the NBA’s 2016-2017 Rookie of the Year award. (Nuebeck) Hinkie gained a reputation around the league for winning every trade he was a part of one GM credited this to Hinkie’s certainty and patience, it was seen as intimidating, Hinkie knew what he want and he was willing to wait for it. (Ballard) This is not seen as the norm in pro sports, where one exec is even quoted saying “To be honest, most of us are just plowing through.” (Ballard) Hinkie’s certainty and patience were both personified in what became the Sixer’s new campaign slogan – “Trust the Process”.  Hinkie’s plan was as simple as it was complex.  Along with the deals and roster moves made, Hinkie fundamentally believed in the importance of the NBA draft, and the unparalleled level of skill that could potentially be drawn from it.  In the case of the NBA, taking a player high in the draft is often based from the estimates of the person’s skill. (Staw & Hoang) This type of value could then be put to use in two different ways; as either a long-term building block for the future or as a highly valued trading asset.  The importance of the asset in a trade cannot be undervalued, for even if the player doesn’t necessarily pan out, the NBA tends to perceive a faulty parallel between a player’s draft order and his future performance, particularly when making trades. (Staw & Hoang) In an attempt to realize the draft’s potential the Sixer’s made strategic, long-term draft choices such as Joel Embiid and Dario Saric, that other team’s passed on due to their lack of immediate availability. Hinkie on the other hand, consistently practiced patience by accepting these high-risk, high reward players that other teams passed on, hoping one would eventually emerge as one of the Superstars the rest of the NBA so dearly covets.

Sam Hinkie’s plan may come off as drastic, and many people have received it as such.  An outlandish plan rooted in creating a losing culture.  Tanking is not new to the NBA, not by a long stretch.  In 1985, the Houston Rockets changed the NBA forever when they pulled off a massive mid-season tank job that began with a record of 20-26 before bottoming out and finishing with a record of 29-53.  While this record allowed the Rockets to draft University of Houston superstar and future NBA Hall of Famer, Hakeem Olajuwon, the means by which it was attained were so blatant the NBA was forced to implement a Draft Lottery in hopes no one would purposely play such bad basketball again.  In more recent history the San Antonio Spurs, thought of by many as the class of the NBA, sat out David Robinson, to attain the 2nd worst record in NBA, with their eyes set on acquiring future NBA Hall of Famer Tim Duncan.  In that same year, the Boston Celtics also had their eyes set on Mr. Duncan. The Celtics posted a franchise worst 15-67 record in an attempt to acquire the rookie big man, the Celtics ended up with the 3rd pick in that year’s draft.  Tanking was by no means a fool proof plan, but Hinkie believed with the right amount of patience and determination, the potential of winning the draft lottery could be maximized especially when the alternative plan is hopeless mediocrity in the parity deprived NBA.

The lack of parity in the NBA has been evident to fans, players, and coaches alike for many years now.  Before every season begins most NBA followers have a good sense for how the league shapes out and this sense rarely experiences many surprises, especially at the top.   It is statistically proven that the NBA has achieved much less parity over the years than the other 3 North American professional sports. (Rockerbie) One theory experts use to explain this lack of competition is the law of large numbers. The law states the great amount of scoring attempts taken in the NBA versus the other 3 major sports, greatly reduces the influence of random outcomes which causes the outcomes of individual games to be determined by the team’s pure talent. (Rockerbie) Couple this law of large numbers with a playoff system that requires a team to win 4 separate 7-game series to win an NBA championship, the better team nearly always wins. Teams in the NBA simply cannot rely on luck or circumstance; they must rely on having the superior roster. The need to own a superior roster in turn gives a need to own superior players. The NBA recognizes this, their business model relies little on parity, but instead on the promotion of the league’s individual superstar players playing in highly promoted matchup games. (Rockerbie) The league’s formula has still been successful, the promotion of superstar players outweighs the mediocrity present in the league, despite owning the lowest rate of league-wide competition in the 4 major North American sports, from 1990 to 2011 the league continued to grow at an annual average growth rate of 15.3% (Rockerbie) All of these factors make the need for superstars in the NBA quite evident.  It’s what make player’s like Michael Jordan, LeBron James, and Kobe Bryant almost seem larger than the league itself.  Team’s with superstars win, and teams without them don’t, and in a market where free agents are incentivized by teams with the ability to help them win now, team’s that lack this talent are constantly stuck in the middle ground searching for direction.  

Hinkie chose to give the Sixers a direction, a sort of upward facing parabola, one that would need to bottom out for a little bit before picking it back up to head upwards toward the ultimate goal, championships.  This is how the fans of Philadelphia understood it and many were willing to wait, feeling Hinkie was on their side. But these types of drastic plans never come without critics and Hinkie had his fair share of them throughout Philadelphia and across America alike.  But Hinkie would remain unfazed, he was rarely available to the media, preferring to keep his personality and agenda out of the ears and eyes of the public and the rest of the NBA in general, much like Bill Belichick whom Hinkie is a big fan of. (Ballard) But one downfall of Hinkie’s might’ve this lack of availability, Belichick can get away with it because of his proven track record. If Bill Belichick were to have gone 4 straight seasons at the bottom of the NFL the Boston media would not stand for the type of behavior he gets away with today.  That’s what winning does, it creates respect and while many were on board with Hinkie’s plan, America is still a “what have you done for me lately” country not necessarily a “what will you do in the future”. It’s a country of results and narratives and when Hinkie couldn’t produce either of these, it rubbed many people the wrong way.  In the middle of the 2015-2016 NBA season, the league’s front office pressured Sixers ownership to hire Jerry Colangelo, longtime NBA GM, to run the show with Hinkie. (Ballard)  Sixers ownership acted accordingly, forcing Hinkie to take on a lesser role. (Ballard) Hinkie responded by unleashing a 13-page manifesto towards the Sixers front office, littered with quotes from the likes of Warren Buffet, Elon Musk, and Abraham Lincoln all boldly proclaiming his resignation. (Hinkie) A resignation that sent waves throughout the Philadelphia and NBA community alike. (Ballard) Waves that might not stop going for a long time.

Most of the criticism Hinkie received would come directly after this resignation, the anti-Hinkiites in the sports media were out in droves calling his process a failure.  But Hinkie’s plan extends longer then his employment as he himself quoted in his resignation letter “Jeff Bezos says that if Amazon has a good quarter it’s because of work they did 3, 4, 5 years ago—not because they did a good job that quarter.”  (Hinkie) Sam Hinkie’s followers are still believing in “The Process” even without their leader.  Hinkie, probably unintentionally, would emerge as a cult leader in Philadelphia, a figure that challenged old ideals with an intention of breaking away from the narratives which contain heroes and villains and character arcs which Hinkie says comes from the “lizard parts of our brains”, believing they are too simplistic and in turn hide truth and fact.  Hinkie is a forward-thinking man that may be too ahead of his time, or at least the NBA’s time.  After his time in Philadelphia he moved to Silicon Valley to be with as he puts it “like-minded people” (Ballard) Hinkie believes that intellect, not class is the new driver in society. (Ballard)  He’s emerged as a figure unlike anything the sports world has ever seen before, almost like the Steve Jobs of basketball, and his plan reflected this, as Sports Illustrated writer Chris Ballard put it, “He did the kind of stuff people talk about late at night after three beers, because theoretically it just might work, but no one actually does.” That was Sam Hinkie and in a short 3 and a half years he turned the league on his head before it finally had enough and kicked him out.

But that’s not the end of Hinkie’s story.  Since leaving Philadelphia Hinkie’s cult following has became stronger than ever.  Joel Embiid, whom Hinkie drafted in 2014, has emerged as a transcendent talent and has given himself the nickname “The Process”.  About a month and a half after Hinkie was let go, the Sixer’s won the first overall pick in the draft lottery and selected Ben Simmons, a player many experts have compared to the likes of Magic Johnson and LeBron James, two all-time greats.  Dario Saric, the “Euro-stash”, many fans believed would never come over has since emerged as the new favorite for 2017 NBA Rookie of the Year. (Nuebeck) Since being pushed out, a slew of Hinkie’s moves began to bear fruit from the roots he laid down, growing his cult following making seem as a Christ-like figure in Philadelphia, sacrificing his own job for his vision and the city as a whole.  There are still “Trust the Process” chants at Sixer’s games. (Ballard) While the old media markets in Philadelphia are still eerie to give credit to Hinkie, new mediums have rallied in his support. The blog Liberty Ballers and the podcast Rights to Ricky Sanchez are two popular media sources for a younger generation of Sixers fans, in a 21st century time of rapid technological growth and ideas alike the timing seems right. (Eskin) Hinkie’s ability to break molds and change the way people think has rarely been seen in the world of sports, a world still dominated by “lizard brain” narratives and a win now mentality.  Upon resignation his “Process” was dubbed as a failure, but the events that have recently taken place have began to change this simplistic narrative that Hinkie desperately tried to detach himself from.  Sam Hinkie brought a “Process” to the table- infused with analytics and an extremely intellectually based forward-thinking approach, the Sixer’s former GM completely challenged every traditional ideal instilled in the NBA and he lost his job for it, and it might’ve worked.
