Why does Markelle Fultz always have us in our feelings?

When the 76ers traded for the first overall pick in the 2017 NBA Draft, there was no doubt why they did it. It was to select Markelle Fultz, a player who looked like the best point guard prospect in many years, a sure thing, a potential star who could both reliably knock down pull up 3’s and drive to the rim with ease. Joel Embiid was thrilled, promoting the coming of the FEDS — a four-headed monster of young talent in the forms of Fultz, Embiid, Dario Saric, and Ben Simmons. And it was not merely that Fultz looked to be a great prospect in a vacuum, but that he looked to be just what this Sixers team needed.

He was projected to be a scorer, a playmaker, a shooter — skills that any team can use at any time, but especially this particular Sixers team who had a bevy of players who could score down low, though not many who were able to reliably do so outside of the paint. He was supposed to be the final piece of the puzzle, the top pick who would give Philadelphia the best collection of young talent since the days when Oklahoma City had Kevin Durant, Russell Westbrook, and James Harden. It has not worked out like that, though.

When you watch Fultz play today, it’s both tantalizing and frustrating. You see brief moments of transcendence alongside moments where he looks to have lost both his confidence and his ability. If you’re still a believer in his abilities — a glass half Fultz kind of person — you hone in on the former, believing that these flashes of greatness happen often enough to not be coincidences, that this is the true Markelle, just waiting to be uncovered and unleashed, helping take the Sixers to the next level.

On the other hand, it’s just as easy to focus on the still awkward shooting form, the shots he avoids taking and the fact that he and Simmons have not proven themselves to be able to share the floor with each other in any sort of way that makes the most of their respective strengths. At his best, he still looks like a number one pick as he moves fluidly across the floor, finding the smallest sliver of lanes to cut to the rim or to pass out to an open shooter, sliding over picks as easily as any other guard in the league. In these moments, it’s easy to be reminded of why he was the nearly unanimous pick to go first overall and looked like a franchise cornerstone. There are the other moments, though, the less encouraging ones that make the glimpses of potential greatness seem to be phantasms, illusions that are only there to tease us, prompting us to foolishly get our hopes up.

Fultz has become an object of sympathy for many NBA fans, including myself. Almost every 76ers game is appointment viewing for me, and while I love watching Embiid dominate opponents in the post and the passing wizardry of Simmons, the primary draw for me is watching Fultz. My emotions rise and fall with every drive, every pass, every shot. I hold my breath when he elevates to shoot, hoping that it will go in, not only because I want him to succeed and become the player I expected him to be when he was drafted, but for his own sake as well. After each game, I check his stats, looking at his plus/minus and his shot charts, trying to find reasons to continue believing in him, evidence that my faith in his development is well placed. Why do I care so much? Why do I feel bad for him in a way I never did for Greg Oden or Anthony Bennett — two other number one picks whose careers could charitably be described as disappointing?

We like mysteries, but ones that go unsolved for too long unsettle us as much as they intrigue. It’s pretty easy to figure out why Bennett was unable to work out as an NBA player — he couldn’t shoot, his conditioning was somehow awful, and he was too small to really score in the post. It wasn’t a tragedy, just a bad pick. Similarly, there’s no mystery why the career of Greg Oden didn’t pan out; his body just wasn’t equipped for an NBA career. I guess you could say it’s quite simple with Fultz as well, that he simply lost the ability to shoot, which is true enough but the question of where that ability went is the bigger one, the one that led to every new bit of footage of Fultz shooting to be analyzed as if the secret to human happiness were contained somewhere within it. There was indisputably a shoulder injury of some sort, but everything turns into speculation past that.

With DeMar DeRozan and Kevin Love opening up about their own struggles with mental health over the past year, there is now a greater awareness than ever before of the issues that plague not only professional athletes, but ourselves as well. It would be presumptuous and irresponsible to say that Fultz has any diagnosable or classifiable mental health problems of his own, but it is pretty much universally believed that at least some part of his playing issues stems from non-physical issues. It may just be a lack of confidence, a fear of reaggravating his shoulder injury, a sense of being overwhelmed in light of massive expectations, or a combination of all these, but it’s easy to see how any one of these could be suffocating for a 20-year-old expected to be a franchise savior. And I believe that’s where some of this empathy comes from — an injury is unfortunate, but the thoughts and doubts that Fultz appears to be struggling with, those are relatable.

We certainly face our own challenges in our daily lives, challenges that threaten to overwhelm and consume us, but we do not play out these battles in front of millions, with our every move being examined by beat writers and analysts and fans on Twitter. If we are aware of how difficult it can be to give a presentation at work, of how anxiety-inducing it is to face expectations and then be forced to meet, or exceed, them, then we can make some sense of Fultz’s own struggles, of how intense the pressures must be and how difficult it must be to navigate them. It’s only a relative understanding, of course, considering the outsized scope and stakes that we can hardly imagine, but nevertheless, we know the fear that presses against us in these moments and can feel for someone who appears to feel a similar dread encroaching upon them.

Historically, we have not been extremely charitable to high draft picks who flamed out or failed to reach what was assumed to be their high potential. There’s a tendency to blame them as if their failure in the NBA is indicative of some personal failing, a moral shortcoming of some sort. Kwame Brown is judged and held accountable for being ‘too fragile’ to deal with the harsh world of the NBA while Eddy Curry is largely perceived as a lazy glutton. I’m not sure there’s been an entire sea change here, but it appears like we’re recently more likely to be a bit more charitable in our assessments of young players, able to acknowledge the extenuating circumstances that were ignored before.

Now, there’s a willingness to admit that few players could have thrived in the environment Brown was drafted into, with Michael Jordan yelling at him nonstop, questioning his masculinity and ability in equal measure. Curry, meanwhile, was a member of two of the more poorly constructed and chaotic teams of the 2000’s, all while struggling with a heart condition. In this sense, Fultz came along at a good time, a time where we are more willing to understand that successful careers are contextual and that the issues that plague one’s mind and body are not their faults, but something to be understood and sympathized with.

When you watch highlights of Fultz at Washington, he was thrilling, able to dominate the game in so many ways. I want to see that again, and it’s hard to fathom why any basketball fan wouldn’t. The more great players there are, the better the NBA is and Fultz looked like he could be one of them, someone you would rearrange your schedule to watch. And I believe that is part of why so many still pull for him; it’s not merely empathy — though that’s part of it — but a desire to see potential greatness transformed into the real thing.

Brett Brown, and the Sixers franchise, thankfully appear committed to working with Fultz throughout this rough and awkward period. They were unwilling to consider trading him for Kawhi Leonard during the offseason and also did not include him in the recent trade for Jimmy Butler, apparently believing he still has the ability to prove himself worthy of the team’s initial investment in him. However, there are definite worries about how Butler will affect Fultz’s development considering how calamitous his presence seemed to be on the psyches of Karl-Anthony Towns and Andrew Wiggins. There’s also a possibility that this trade will take some pressure off of Fultz as they will need to rely on him less than ever if they hope to be competitive, but it seems just as likely that the situation will become more volatile. Of course, the Sixers aren’t merely hoping to be competitive, but one of the best teams in the league, and if they are going to reach those heights, Fultz is sure to be a major part of that process.

I still believe in Markelle Fultz, though I know part of that is due to my sincere hope that he becomes the player it looked like he could be. I’ve absolutely seen Fultz play great basketball before and the question is just whether or not he is capable of doing it again. In spite of an awkward shooting form and an apparent loss of confidence, I choose to remain hopeful even if I sometimes struggle to justify my doing so.