Dan Pfeiffer is a New York Times bestselling author, successful podcast host, and former senior advisor to President Barack Obama. He’s also a tortured lifelong fan of the Philadelphia 76ers, who just suffered a devastating blow to their 2020 playoff prospects: A knee injury to star point guard/power forward Ben Simmons that will sideline him for the duration. On Tuesday afternoon, GQ called Dan up for a chat about Philly’s future, the polarizing Joel Embiid-Ben Simmons partnership, why Donald Trump would’ve lost the 2016 election if LeBron James’ More Than a Vote campaign existed four years ago, and much more.
GQ: What have been your main takeaways from the bubble so far?
Dan Pfeiffer: I had very mixed feelings about the NBA coming back. Some of those are related to my Sixers fandom, which we can discuss, but watching the NBA exist successfully a few weeks in, there’s this frustration that we could be doing this as a country. The NBA is doing what South Korea and some of the other countries have done that the United States has been incapable of doing. So it sort of speaks to the what-might-have-been. But to their credit, both from a health and safety perspective and a fan-viewing experience, the NBA has done as well as you could possibly imagine. The games are pretty watchable for an empty gym, which is pretty impressive.
How did your Sixers fandom start?
I grew up in Delaware, right outside of Philly. I went to my first Sixers game in the Dr. J era, Dr. J and Moses in the early 1980s when I was seven. I went to Sixers basketball camps several summers in a row. They would have these sessions that were centered around players, so the coolest thing I did as a child was I went to the Thump and Bump session, which was when Charles Barkley and Rick Mahorn came to your camp for a couple days. That was much cooler than what happened the next summer after the Barkley trade: the Hawk and Dawk, Hersey Hawkins and Johnny Dawkins. So real step down that next year [laughs].
I was also the same year at Georgetown as Allen Iverson. So I spent two years watching him play in college and then he went to the Sixers. Then I became one of those super annoying, to others I guess, Sixers Process fans, where I celebrated every asset hoarded, every trade made, I worshipped at the cult of Sam Hinkie, and here we are now.
To be honest, I had mixed emotions when I watched the Sixers blow it against the Pacers in their first game. It’s probably the most normal I’ve felt since COVID hit. But it also feels weird to feel normal. There’s so much happening in the world that—and I don’t begrudge anyone’s desire for normalcy, people should have it—but it feels like an out of body experience to care so much about how the Sixers do. Both COVID, the larger conversation about structural racism and everything else, it is harder to care about sports so passionately.
You have a cautious, worrisome mentality when approaching political elections. Are you also that way when rooting for the Sixers?
Yes [laughs]. I absolutely am. That is a very appropriate attitude to have, particularly for this Sixers team. If you go back the last 3 or 4 years here, at every turn something bad happens. This is a team that’s won 50 games two years a row and would’ve probably won 50 had this season continued. Even if that’s below expectations, they were a very good team that has come very far from The Process days very quickly. But you have to be a weary sports fan to be a Sixers fan because every time Joel Embiid falls down it could be the end of the team as you know it. You’re living on the razor’s edge at all times.