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On Pro Basketball: 76ers Learn an Old Lesson About Youth Movements

Upon his unanticipated return to the N.B.A., Jerry Colangelo especially enjoyed one Philadelphia news media report noting how the 76ers had not so coincidently hired a 76-year-old to restore their credibility.

“It then said not to think this is a 76-year-old who doesn’t have the energy that’s necessary for the job,” he said.

Age is a number, Colangelo contends, and in the case of the historically bad 76ers, the higher the better. Sam Hinkie, Philadelphia’s 38-year-old general manager, had turned the team into a competitive eyesore and desperately needed a father figure. With encouragement from an exasperated N.