{"id":426371,"date":"2026-01-20T22:22:08","date_gmt":"2026-01-20T22:22:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/426371\/"},"modified":"2026-01-20T22:22:08","modified_gmt":"2026-01-20T22:22:08","slug":"5-sixers-thoughts-on-tyrese-maxey-and-his-nba-ascension","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/426371\/","title":{"rendered":"5 Sixers thoughts on Tyrese Maxey and his NBA ascension"},"content":{"rendered":"

Tyrese Maxey is making a leap and is fresh off a 29-point, eight-assist, eight-steal performance in a win over the lowly Pacers on Monday evening. Let\u2019s lean into the energy Maxey is creating and do a \u201c5 Sixers thoughts\u201d column dedicated solely to him\u2026<\/p>\n

Maxey: All-Star Game starter and\u2026 future All-Star Game MVP?<\/p>\n

No guard has been this type of lightning force for the Sixers since Allen Iverson\u2019s peak. Iverson\u2019s age-25 season saw him win NBA MVP honors and lead the Sixers to the Finals. While both of those things unfortunately feel a tad out of reach for Maxey in his own age-25 season, there was another accolade that Iverson picked up that year that Maxey could undoubtedly challenge for: All-Star Game MVP.<\/p>\n

In a legendary bout at the 2001 All-Star Game in Washington, D.C., Iverson dropped 25 points to go with five assists and four steals as the East beat an ultra-stacked Western Conference squad. With Maxey\u2019s first All-Star starting nod under his belt now for next month\u2019s festivities, he could no doubt heat up and add an All-Star Game MVP Award to his mantle.<\/p>\n

I need the New Balance Maxeys<\/p>\n

I haven\u2019t bought a pair of fresh basketball sneakers in a long time, settling more so into New Balance trainers and HOKAs for daily use as I\u2019ve progressed into my 30s. That\u2019s a reality check for sure. The era of me gobbling up Air Jordan 11s and 4s with busboy money at the turn of the 2010s is sadly long gone.<\/p>\n

I may need to make an exception when Maxey\u2019s first signature sneaker releases later in 2026, as news broke about that on Tuesday morning<\/a>.<\/p>\n

I don\u2019t think anyone\u2019s been in a rush to wear some Joel Embiid Sketchers, but, historically, from Charles Barkley to Iverson himself, Sixers players have had some legendary signature sneakers. I need Maxey to continue that tradition. Guards always have better designs than big men anyway\u2026<\/p>\n

A 20-year-old rookie Maxey played fewer minutes in the 2021 Eastern Conference Semifinals series against the Hawks (77) than Furkan Korkmaz (139) and 34-year-old George Hill (110)? Awesome stuff. I\u2019m not still bitter or anything! It\u2019s not like that series irrevocably changed my relationship with the Sixers as an entity and the sport of basketball as a whole or anything!<\/p>\n

What I most want from Maxey this spring\u2026<\/p>\n

I am more of a Sixers pessimist than most even before last week\u2019s skid. I am under no pretense that this team is making the Finals, but my true goal for the Sixers overall this season, and Maxey specifically, is for him to be the best player in a playoff series that the team wins. Sure, people far and wide would joke about it just being another second-round exit from a franchise famous for them, but the equation is so different than it has been at different points in the Joel Embiid era.<\/p>\n

A first-round matchup that sees Maxey going nuclear and looking like one of the best players on the planet in victory could even warm my frozen Sixers soul.<\/p>\n

The city needs to rally around Maxey more<\/p>\n

Look, I know it\u2019s an Eagles city and it always will be. I\u2019m freaking out over who the next offensive coordinator will be just as much as anyone. The Phillies are pissing everyone off before pitchers and catchers even report though. The Flyers are sagging after their own promising start. The Sixers have the floor at the moment. Up-and-downs and injuries, per usual, have kept them from firmly establishing themselves as legitimate Eastern Conference contenders, but isn\u2019t rooting for a guy like Maxey something we always wished for since the dawn of the post-Iverson era?<\/p>\n

The Process years were all about establishing Embiid as one of the game\u2019s greatest and while that panned out, it didn\u2019t result in the team success we all dreamed it would bring about. That sucks, but that\u2019s the reality of contention in the modern NBA. I understand people who are jaded and have tuned out since the collapses in 2021 and 2023 and the health setbacks that Embiid has had to endure, but isn\u2019t this what it was all about? Watching an in-prime superstar command the court and make the extraordinary seem ordinary?<\/p>\n

A magical run to the Finals isn\u2019t happening in a few months, but what\u2019s to say that\u2019s not the case two years from now with an improved VJ Edgecombe as an elite running mate for this guy? I don\u2019t have to convince the people who read this fine site of that, but I wish Philly felt at least a tad more all in on Maxey.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Tyrese Maxey is making a leap and is fresh off a 29-point, eight-assist, eight-steal performance in a win…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":426372,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[557],"tags":[64,63,590,107314,85],"class_list":{"0":"post-426371","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nba","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-nba","11":"tag-sixers-analysis","12":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/426371","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=426371"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/426371\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/426372"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=426371"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=426371"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=426371"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}