Sam Hinkie, architect of the Sixers' three-year strategy of rebuilding through scraping the bottom of the standings while collecting future draft picks like bubble-gum cards, remains the general manager in title alone. No one in the league expects Hinkie's voice to carry over Colangelo's when it comes to personnel decisions going forward. That ship has sailed, along with the needlessly complex equations that built it.

So as the Sixers' tale of woe wound hopelessly around the league, the lone victory registered against the equally clueless Lakers on Dec. 1, it made its way to the six-block, one-avenue radius that separates NBA headquarters from Harris' office at Apollo Global Management. And now, there's a new pilot at the controls.

After all, it's just basketball -- and the point of basketball is simply to collect good basketball players and get them to play together.

Harris, with an assist from the commissioner, finally realized that it's not rocket science.

The future holds the possibility to be great or terrible, and since it has not yet occurred it remains simultaneously both.