Basketball is not a sport, it's a way of life.
Embiid screed...
There is a part of me that genuinely feels bad for Joel Embiid. The Sixers center has become an offensive force who has cultivated a deadly hybrid of styles that is both physically dominant and skillfully excellent. His ability to score the basketball and assert his will upon a game is nearly as great as any player we’ve seen over the last few decades. Yet, be it because of the ceaseless deluge of injuries or because of a flaw in his programming that forces glitching late in games, his inadequacies are also about as great as we’ve seen from a dominant player.
After succumbing to a Knicks team that ultimately showed more heart and composure, Embiid and the Sixers face a sobering offseason that is sure to be rife with questions. The largest of which has to be whether Embiid really is a player that you can win a title with. The Sixers' beleaguered center was an absolute force for much of the series, averaging 33 points and 10.8 rebounds. He also shot just 44.4% from the field while coughing-up 4.2 turnovers and generally seemed scared of the moment late in games—stop me if you’ve heard this before. Embiid playing through an injury was admirable, but the fact that he was hobbled has become so commonplace that his likelihood of being injured has to be baked into any evaluation of him as a player. The injuries, efficiency issues, turnovers, and late-game yips have now become so consistent that whatever the reason du jour, the reality is that they have come to define Embiid’s playoff performances. Perhaps that isn’t fair for a player that carries such a substantial burden, but heavy is the head…
Yes, basketball is a team game, but at some point, the results of the teams led by Embiid, put together for the benefit of Embiid, and orbiting around the play of Embiid, also have to reflect upon Embiid. I’m not saying that one player can be fully blamed for a team’s outcome. I am saying that a player’s greatness can be defined in part by their lacking the ability to will a team to a deep playoff run. Over the last several years, Embiid’s Sixers have had more talent than the ’20 Heat, the ’21 Hawks, the ’21 Clippers, and the ’22 Mavericks. Each are teams that recently made conference finals runs because of the singular greatness of a star player galvanizing a unit of over-performing teammates. The fact that we still have yet to see this kind of deep playoff push from an Embiid-led team is ultimately an indictment of the greatness of him as a player.
There is still plenty of time for this to change. A part of me was hoping that this would be the season that Embiid made the type of run that would silence voices like mine. (Though I would have been incredibly saddened had that come at the cost of this fun bunch Knicks group.) Instead, here we all are again, loudly chirping more questions.