Sixers' Tyrese Maxey Gets His Way and Gets Back to Work in Offseason

Sixers young guard Tyrese Maxey convinced his team's player development staff to allow him to get back to work this week.

Philadelphia 76ers 2020 first-round pick Tyrese Maxey is a workaholic. During his pre-draft process back in the fall, the former Kentucky freshman showed teams he had a relentless work ethic by participating in two-a-days every day. 

Maxey would get up first thing in the morning and get a basketball-related workout in. Then, he'd hit the weights before concluding his morning workout session. After taking a break throughout the day, the young guard would get back in the gym later on and finish up with another shootaround session.

He did that all the way up until the draft day. By the end of the night on November 18th, 2020, Tyrese Maxey was a member of the Sixers. All of that extra work wasn't for show to help boost his Instagram following or his stock at the draft.

All throughout the 2020-2021 NBA season, Maxey proved to the Sixers that he's going to work nonstop so he can get better. Maxey was in the gym at the team's practice facility getting his reps on the days the Sixers had off. 

Sixers head coach Doc Rivers considered Maxey to be arguably the hardest working young player he's ever coached in his career after spending an entire season with him. And the soon-to-be second-year guard didn't plan to take a long break anytime soon either, despite the Sixers' season ending last Sunday. 

“I walked in, and I walked onto the court, and I started shooting a little bit before our little meeting,” Maxey said on Monday. “I talked to (Spencer Rivers) in player development, and I said Friday [we'll get back to work]. . .  I said Friday, and he said no, so we’ll see. We’ll see how that argument goes, but I’m hoping Friday get back in the gym and get to work.”

Although Philly's player development staff attempted to encourage Maxey to take a longer break after a long and exhausting season, the young guard got his way ultimately as he returned to the practice facility on Friday morning to work out.

Well, Tyrese Maxey did say he wanted to get back in the gym on Friday #Sixers pic.twitter.com/EjEPCLg7KJ

— Ky Carlin (@Ky_Carlin) June 25, 2021

“It has been a long season, though,” Maxey admitted earlier in the week. “A long season, and like I said, on the off days, I was always in here, so that was every day of basketball from what, November or early December to now June, so I don’t know. I don’t know. This is my first NBA offseason."

Apparently, a few days off was good enough for Maxey. Now, the young budding star is continuing to work on his goal of getting slightly better each and every day leading up to his Sophomore season in Philadelphia.

"One thing that I will say that all will be going on during this offseason is I will get one percent better every single day," he concluded. "I’ll make that promise to myself.”

Justin Grasso covers the Philadelphia 76ers for Sports Illustrated. You can follow him for live updates on Twitter: @JGrasso_.