Should 76ers fans be concerned after Markelle Fultz’s preseason start?

University of Washington product Markelle Fultz was the consensus No. 1-overall pick entering the 2017 NBA Draft, and the Philadelphia 76ers traded up just to get him. But after two long-awaited preseason games, Fultz hasn’t shown the scoring touch experts lauded when he lit college basketball on fire before entering his name into the draft.

Instead, Fultz has been chucking up bricks, and even though inefficiency is common among first-year players, his early performances have concerned a Philly fan base eager for the rookie to help bring the 76ers to their first playoff appearance since 2012.

In his Oct. 4 preseason debut against the Memphis Grizzlies, Fultz scored just four points on an awful 2-of-13 shooting night. He was a minus-11 while on the court, and the Grizzlies pounded the 76ers, 110-89.

But even though he had 12 points on 5-of-11 shooting against Boston on Monday, he didn’t look much better on the floor than he was against Memphis. Fultz shied away from jump shots as if he was deathly allergic, and even missed shoo-in layups that left some scratching their heads.

Those don’t sound like the tendencies of a player who was supposed to be one of the two best talents entering the NBA this summer.

Philly eventually lost to Boston, 113-96, after trailing by as much as 34.

Most of the allure surrounding Fultz leading up to the draft was his label as a dual-threat scorer: he could take you off the dribble and score at the rim or dance around the three-point line before pulling a triple.

Some even likened him to James Harden.

Those skills helped him average 23.2 points at Washington nailing 41.4 percent of his average of five threes per game. But the rookie opted to give his shooting stroke a makeover halfway through the offseason. After shooting 65 percent at Washington, Fultz lowered his free throw release point.

Now, it’s clear that his free throw is broken:

And his jump shot is, too:

Fultz’s shot is so broken, he didn’t even look to shoot anything other than layups against the Celtics on Monday.

And even though 76ers head coach Brett Brown thinks people are reading too much into Fultz’s jump shot, he can’t take back the comments he made a little over a week ago:

“We gotta get him back on track,” Brown said, according to NJ Advance Media’s Jake Pavorsky. “His heart is in the right place. All by himself he pivoted out over the summer to try and make it better, and tweak it.

“The good news is he was in a place at one point, and it’s not like it’s a rebuild from ground zero. You just gotta rewind.”

Absolutely not, and for two reasons: a) it’s preseason, and b) it’s preseason.

We’ve made this mistake before: Harrison Barnes had a god-awful preseason before averaging 19 points and five rebounds in a career year in Dallas. So we’re not going to jump the gun this time and call Markelle Fultz a bust after two games.

We’ve got to give him time to hash everything out.

This is the time players and coaches spend fine tuning things, like a jump shot or a game plan, to come correct for the regular season. You can’t judge players on games that don’t really count. Especially not 19-year-old kids trying to work the kinks out in their game against older, more seasoned opponents.

If one thing is clear, it’s that Fultz needs to get back to what was working in college, and that’s letting the ball fly from downtown. Defensively, the rookie is still active with his hands and has NBA length at the point guard spot. Brown thinks once the rookie gets back to basics with his shot, everything will be just fine.

”He’s excited to continue to polish up that shot,” he said, “and he will.”