The veteran wing has been a dynamite, two-way force recently for Philadelphia.
Caleb Martin got off to a rough start with the Philadelphia 76ers. He shot 4-of-20 from three across his first seven games and the eye test on those looks was not encouraging. Even shots that did go in often frustratingly had a toe on the line. While acknowledging it was early, Sixers fans were wondering in the back of their minds if this was what we’d signed up for over four years. Would Heat Culture have the last laugh after all?
Of course, this was yet another instance of why you should wait for a reasonable sample size. Martin’s last four games have seen him improve to hitting 6-of-13 from behind the arc. He has 10 steals across his last three games. Over the last two games, Caleb has averaged 17.5 points on 15-of-23 shooting from the field. His season-high 18 points, seven rebounds, and two steals on Wednesday night helped the shorthanded Sixers nearly pull off the upset victory over the undefeated Cleveland Cavaliers.
Following the game, Martin discussed the idea of a silver lining that the team came so close to victory despite missing their three All-Stars:
“Yeah, I mean you got to take the good with the bad. Obviously, these are not the results that we want right now and obviously, there’s a lot of moving pieces. Trying to figure things out a lot of pieces missing right now that we haven’t been able to consistently have together. Those are things that you still have to take positives out of some of the negatives right now and be able to carry over and apply to whenever the pieces do come back. So, I’m not the type to make excuses about whether people are in or not. I still believe we have enough in the locker room to win games. Ultimately, I’m going to approach a loss as if we had everybody, so there’s definitely some things that could have been better on our end and things that we have to clean up in regard to whose in and whose out. We all got to be better especially right now that’s how we’re going to have to win games.”
Defensive flexibility was a selling point in bringing Martin into the fold. With he, Paul George and Kelly Oubre Jr. in the starting lineup, the Sixers have versatile wings with the length and mobility to adapt to different matchups. Caleb talked about what they could look like going forward:
“Yeah, for sure. We cover a lot of ground. Once we start continuing to get those minutes with each other and feeding off each other and seeing how disruptive we can be and build that chemistry on a defensive end there’s no excuse for us not to be some of the best perimeter defenders in the league. Especially, together we have to buy into that and understand that we can be that, but understand it’s not just going to happen just because we do have intangibles, we have to make it happen. We have to do our part, being disruptive, being active, being consistent, and being the gas, helping, talking, communicating, all that stuff matters, and it adds up. It’s not easy none of that stuff is easy, but that’s the league.”
Ultimately, it wasn’t surprising Martin struggled at bit out of the gate with Joel Embiid and Paul George unavailable. He’s great at playing off stars both as a smart cutter and relocating to spot up from the perimeter. Martin’s defensive efforts will be more effective when there’s a rim protector like Embiid back there to give drivers something to worry about in the painted area. Plus, Martin kind of hinted at playing through some sort of injury himself. He had this to say when asked about shooting better recently:
“I got some stuff going on myself. Like I said, I’m not gonna have an excuse or anything so I’ll just leave it at that. There’s things that I have to deal with on my end that I’m doing the best I can as of right now. Those things have to get figured out over time. But that’s a part of my game I have to figure out and be better.”
As the Sixers get healthier (Caleb included, it sounds like), we should continue to see Martin shine as the ultimate swiss army knife role player.