It Was Worth Giving It One Last Shot With Joel
Even if Spike knew this season was doomed to fail, he doesn't regret the Sixers giving it another go with the Big Man.
This was never going to work. We all knew it was never going to work. There was no chance that this Sixers season was going to result in the playoff success we all so desperately crave and deserve. Still, I’m glad they gave it a try.
There will be many people in the next days or weeks or months that say that the right thing for the Sixers to do with Embiid was move on from him a few years ago, and with him, this era of Sixers basketball. I will probably even be one of these people.
The debate will not be if they should have, but when they should have. Perhaps the best time may have been immediately after his MVP season as, insane as that sounds, as it may have been the last time he had positive value in a trade — but there was still fair skepticism that it was “ever going to work.” It would obviously certainly be before they gave him the extension and then went and doubled down on him with signing Paul George for four years and $212 million.
Still, I’m still glad they’re going to be a year late on that decision rather than a year early, even if it is the wrong thing strategically. It’s just the right thing for my soul… to make sure they gave this thing every chance they could have. There will be what-ifs in every scenario, but I am, we all are, so emotionally invested in Joel Embiid’s success in the same way (if not more) we’re invested in the team’s success, that one “what-if” I am not sure if I’d have been able to resolve would have been “what if we had just given it one more chance, and done it a little differently?”
I know this will probably result in the Sixers being in basketball purgatory until at least the end of this decade. But I just think leaving no stone unturned with this particular guy, for this particular era, is something I needed. Even if I have said or will say differently.
Unfortunately sometimes you turn over all the stones and there’s nothing underneath.
PS: We only have two weeks left to raise a few more thousand dollars for homeless animals for Brandywine Valley SPCA’s Walk For Paws. We want to get to $10,000. Also, I want to be the #1 team and quite honestly we’re in danger of falling to #3. Donate here. It will help dogs like Diamond.
Team Ricky
AU wrote something about whether or not he’s gonna be able to talk himself into this Sixers team having any kind of shot at a postseason run (spoiler alert I’m sure he will).
Beckett Sanderson put all this work into his numbers piece that is very good, and looks at whether Dominic Barlow or Kelly Oubre should be the sixth starter. Hours later, with the release of the Embiid news, it tuns out it doesn’t matter at all! Who gives a fuck! They were going to lose in the first round anyway but now this is even a bigger waste! Welcome to the team Beckett, it’s always like this.
Here’s the podcast we did on Thursday night after the Rockets loss about the Embiid news. At least we had some fun Doc stuff to laugh about.
Team Everyone Else
KOC broke the news on how NBA Lottery reform is going to work. I don’t think it’s going to work. It’s almost obviously not going to work. They should have consulted us.
Here’s the thing Shams wrote about the Bucks with the awesome Doc Rivers anecdote from the pod.
Sixers Adam is keeping everyone updated on the Sixers playoff/play-in scenarios.
I think you voice in this editorial what has always been at the core of the argument about NOT trading Embiid. Not just the responses you have had with me, but that of many others who have pushed back on the idea of trading Embiid at various points after the MVP season. That is, you just needed him to be the epicenter of this team because you loved the IDEA of what Embiid could potentially do. You loved the possibility of a fully healthy Embiid, surrounded by a starting 5 with a couple of other very good and healthy players, in the postseason. This idea was never rooted in any reality. The Sixers never won in the playoffs with Embiid, despite many playoff appearances. Embiid has never been fully healthy after that MVP season. Like religion, it was just a deeply held belief that was personal to you. And people get to believe whatever they want to believe.
I have been pretty vocal with the Ricky about trading Embiid after that MVP season. I’ve taken back a lot of crap about my position on wanting the Sixers to move on from Embiid a season (or now, three) EARLY, rather than waiting a season (or three) too long. In retrospect, I probably made a mistake in trying to use the same sort of justifications about cutting ties with Embiid that Hinkie likely used in trading guys like Michael Carter Williams and Jrue Holiday. These were justifications rooted in the idea that we had seen enough already to know that it was not possible to build a real playoff winning team centered on Embiid. I was up against people who just BELIEVED in their soul that Embiid still could be a playoff success in Philly.
Anyway, I appreciate the honesty now about the fact that you needed Embiid to play out his career in Philly, no matter the cost, because of a FEELING of what he meant to you (and I realize I might be understating it, based on the way you just described your feelings above). Sports is largely about this kind of “religious” connection between players and fans. It withstands logic and reason at times. Ultimately, with Embiid, the BELIEF side “won” the debate about “keep him or trade him.” That side will hopefully feel good in the future, knowing they exhausted every second of playing time in Embiid career with him trying to show he could win in Philly. I will always look at it as folly – but I’ve been dealing with Sixers folly since the Moses Malone/Roy Hinson debacle in 1986. I'll live.