DEAN Wade

Wade has played four games for the 76ers this season, all in October. The minutes have been modest, between 12.9 and 20.3 per game. His best night came October 8 against Brooklyn, when he scored 7 points and grabbed 4 rebounds in 15.7 minutes. On October 5 against New York, the team's only win in that stretch, he had 2 points and 5 rebounds in 13.1 minutes with a plus-6.0. The October 10 loss to Boston brought 5 points, 3 rebounds and 1 assist in 20.3 minutes, though his plus-minus was minus-16.0. Then came the October 16 loss to Boston, when he went scoreless with 2 assists in 12.9 minutes before the ankle issue surfaced. Three of the four games were losses. The numbers describe a back-end rotation big who rebounds and passes a bit without demanding touches.

Last season Wade played 59 games for Cleveland and averaged 22.3 minutes. He put up 5.8 points, 4.2 rebounds and 1.5 assists per game, with 0.7 steals and 0.4 blocks. He shot 43.9 percent from the field, 36.2 percent from three and 71.1 percent from the line. His true shooting percentage was 58.0, which is strong for a player with a 9.7 usage rate. In plain terms, he rarely had the ball but made it count when he did. He turned it over just 0.3 times per game. His plus-minus last season was 2.6. Those are the numbers Philadelphia bought: a low-usage forward-center who spaces the floor, protects the ball and does not hurt the team on the floor. Keep in mind those are last season's figures and came in a Cavaliers uniform, not with the Sixers.

Wade's last season ended in the playoffs with Cleveland. In the Detroit series he had 3 points and 3 rebounds in 22.4 minutes on May 15, a loss, then 5 points, 6 rebounds and 1 assist in 20.9 minutes on May 17, a win in which he posted a plus-17.0. The Knicks series followed. On May 19 he scored 10 points with 5 rebounds and 3 assists in 29.3 minutes, his biggest workload in the sample. The next three games against New York were all losses, with 3 points on May 21, then scoreless outings of 16.8 minutes on May 23 and 12.5 minutes on May 25. The minutes shrank as the series went on. That stretch is the last look at Wade in a high-stakes setting before he landed in Philadelphia.

Wade is 29 years old and in his seventh NBA season. He stands 6-9 and weighs 228 pounds, and the 76ers list him as a forward-center. He played college basketball at Kansas State. That size and position flexibility is why he fits as a frontcourt option who can slide between the four and the five depending on the lineup. Last season's 36.2 percent mark from three points, paired with 4.2 rebounds in 22.3 minutes, is the profile of a stretch big who holds up on the glass. In Philadelphia the early minutes have been lighter than that, which is normal for a new arrival finding his place in a rotation. The experience matters too. Seven seasons and a playoff run through two rounds last spring give the Sixers a veteran who has played in tense games.

The only recent item involving Wade came on September 14, a Sixers notes roundup that grouped him with Simons, Barlow and Edwards under a title-hopes framing. That was a preseason notebook, not a trade or contract report, so there is nothing to attribute beyond the fact that he was part of the preseason conversation about the roster. Since then the story has been on the court. Four October games, three of them losses, then an ankle that cost him the Knicks game. The October 22 return estimate is the next date that matters. If he is back for the game after the Knicks, the injury is a footnote. If the out designation lingers, the Sixers will need someone else to cover the frontcourt minutes he was getting.