PHILADELPHIA _ Brett Brown is heading back to California.
The 76ers coach and interim general manager will fly to Los Angeles on Saturday to check in on Markelle Fultz and Joel Embiid and accompany Ben Simmons at Monday's NBA Awards Show. Brown was in L.A. last Monday to watch Fultz workout with shooting coach Drew Hanlen.
There's no doubt that taking another look at Fultz is a priority on the second trip. It appears that he won't play in the NBA Summer League while trying to regain the shooting form that made him the No. 1 overall draft pick in 2017.
"The development on his shot is looking great," Brown said of Fultz. "The progress of his shot is looking great."
Brown added that point guard isn't playing a lot of basketball. The focus has been on his shot.
"It's back to foundational-type stuff," the coach said. "To expedite that worries me a little bit as it relates to summer league, it does. He's in a good place. So I feel not now we can give you guys answers about what that means summer-league wise.
"But no that's a lot on my mind that he's really in a good place and he's coming along."
In other words, it's unlikely that Fultz plays in the summer league, which starts July 6-17.
However, Brown said back on May 10 that he wanted Fultz to play in the summer league. That had a lot to do with the 20-year-old playing in only a combined 17 regular season and playoff games.
Fultz played in the first four regular-season games before being sidelined for the next 68 with what the team called a right-shoulder injury. However, his shooting woes were actually mental, according to several sources. After showing some improvement in his shot, Fultz returned in time for the final 10 games of the season.
He played 4 minutes, 21 seconds in the first half of Game 3 of the first-round series against the Miami Heat on April 19. However, T.J. McConnell took over the point-guard duties in the second half of what was Fultz's last playoff game. He had played in the first two games of that series.
Brown thinks participating in shooting drills instead of playing basketball is the right path for Fultz.
"I think there's a timeline of that where you are going to start doing some things skill-wise and handle and play," Brown said. "But I think when you look at what's most important, what thing needs the most work, it's that. I don't really want to pivot out of that if we think it's going to hurt a very elementary way we are going about reclaiming his shot."
