Joel Embiid: “We got rid of Jimmy, just to make sure he needed the ball in his hands”

[draftnightsuit]

Keeping Tobias Harris and Simmons while letting Jimmy walk is the absolute worst combination you could ask for.

Not to mention handing Horford that bloated deal. Brand was like "you know what will be a great way to spend all of our cap space? On a PF and center..." All the while the two franchise players are a PF (who thinks he's a PG) and a center. So they had to run out there this clunky 4 big man line-up when the league was actively shifting to small ball.

Philly could’ve solved all their problems by getting a real PG and moving Simmons full time to PF. Let him play point forward in the open floor but in the half court he plays as a big.

Maybe if Fultz wasn’t such a disaster, this could’ve happened. Allowing Simmons to indulge in the gimmick that he’s a PG (while never improving his shooting) has killed a potential ATG team. Also, trading for Tobias was a huge mistake.

[SharpyShuffle]

The starting unit shot the least three's per game than any other starting unit.

Wonder if this has anything to do with their starting PG flat out refusing to shoot the ball...

Has as much to do with Harris as anyone else

He’s a good 3 point shooter but has come to prefer the mid range and, as a result, his 3pa were a career low last season

Lol.

It has far more to do with Simmons than anyone else. I'm pretty certain that PGs shoot the most 3s of any player position.

Complaining that Simmons' team doesn't shoot enough threes to give him space is like complaining that Peter Dinklage's team isn't tall enough

[twyzted]

Jimmy Butler had a worse playoff performance than Ben Simmons.

14 points on 16 shots!! A whopping 29% from the field and a +/- of negative 21.5 points per GAME in a sweep.

If you think Simmons was bad, that might be the worst playoff performance ever that no one is talking about.

But it’s Jimmy Butler, the guy who gets a pass for every playoff failure.

LOL. He also took the Heat to the Finals and put up 40 against LeBron.

Something Simmons could never even dream of doing.

It was a great finals showing by Jimmy! I never said anything to the contrary.

I’m specifically talking about last post season which was a complete and utter failure. Any other “star” player gets run across the coals for that performance yet it’s swept under the rug.

Also Simmons has just turned 25, he’s got plenty of time to reach the finals. He’s achieved more in his first 3 seasons than Jimmy.

Simmons was the first pick and jimmy was the last pick in the 1st round, so if anything Jimmy has exceded the expectations of him coming into the league, while ben really has been underwhelming since entering the league.

[BlackThought]

got rid of the dawg and kept the bitch.

[AussieCeltic]

LOL. He also took the Heat to the Finals and put up 40 against LeBron.

Something Simmons could never even dream of doing.

It was a great finals showing by Jimmy! I never said anything to the contrary.

I’m specifically talking about last post season which was a complete and utter failure. Any other “star” player gets run across the coals for that performance yet it’s swept under the rug.

Also Simmons has just turned 25, he’s got plenty of time to reach the finals. He’s achieved more in his first 3 seasons than Jimmy.

Simmons was the first pick and jimmy was the last pick in the 1st round, so if anything Jimmy has exceded the expectations of him coming into the league, while ben really has been underwhelming since entering the league.

Yeh and? I never said anything about their expectations based on draft position and what they’ve done. I was originally replying to people saying Sixers would’ve won the championship with Jimmy last year which is laughable when he had even worse numbers than Simmons.

Of course I recognise Jimmy had worked his butt off to get where he is. Does that mean now he’s at this “star” level, we excuse him from poor performances? He’s been in the league 12 seasons. At this point in his career, he should be held to a higher standard than Simmons who has just turned 25.

[DwayneSchintzus]

Also if you had a problem with it you should have said something THEN.

The great players of this league wouldnt have just let this happen and say “i told you so”

[Yeggo Poleggo]

Sixers didn't get rid of Jimmy.

Jimmy left.

Brodie, the org got rid of anything and everything that made sense by keeping Ben Simmons, period.

[Tomjas]

Sixers didn't get rid of Jimmy.

Jimmy left.

Brodie, the org got rid of anything and everything that made sense by keeping Ben Simmons, period.

Jimmy is the only player we should have kept and we compounded the error by signing Tobias

Harris’ contract was a monumental blunder

[twyzted]

It was a great finals showing by Jimmy! I never said anything to the contrary.

I’m specifically talking about last post season which was a complete and utter failure. Any other “star” player gets run across the coals for that performance yet it’s swept under the rug.

Also Simmons has just turned 25, he’s got plenty of time to reach the finals. He’s achieved more in his first 3 seasons than Jimmy.

Simmons was the first pick and jimmy was the last pick in the 1st round, so if anything Jimmy has exceded the expectations of him coming into the league, while ben really has been underwhelming since entering the league.

Yeh and? I never said anything about their expectations based on draft position and what they’ve done. I was originally replying to people saying Sixers would’ve won the championship with Jimmy last year which is laughable when he had even worse numbers than Simmons.

Of course I recognise Jimmy had worked his butt off to get where he is. Does that mean now he’s at this “star” level, we excuse him from poor performances? He’s been in the league 12 seasons. At this point in his career, he should be held to a higher standard than Simmons who has just turned 25.

I just thought it was a odd to compare their first 3 years in the league. Since simmons has been in the league for 5 years, played the last 4.

Simmons has gone from a very good rookie season to regressing in every stat except shooting % outside of ft%.

While Jimmy went from end of the bench guy to a starter avg 20ppg 6rpg 3apg 2spg in the same time as Ben has been active.

Jimmy did have a off playoff this year but that is the first time for him. Every player on the heat outside of bam was having a nightmare series vs the bucks.

While simmons has been pretty bad last 2 playoffs he has played in.

I dont think simmons will lead his team to the finals if he dosent improve his shooting, he might get to the finals but not as #1 guy.

He has shown nothing other then being a high maintenance primadonna.

[DaPessimist]

Last years Jimmy isn't taking the 76ers anywhere. Not sure why Simmons gets **** on for his performance, but Butler gets a pass.

[Buckeye-NBAFan]

You can come up with other narratives. Maybe Jimmy left because of aliens and now he's covering it up.

All you have is the truth Jimmy has given here, Jimmy of all players is going to give you the truth.nhes saying some very controversial things here, why would he say them? He doesn't have to speak at all.

If you choose not to believe what Jimmy is saying on the topic of why he left then you want to have a pretty solid line of evidence to refute it.

What exactly did you hear in that interview?

Butler said he was upset about someone asking if he could be controlled.

If that's what you heard, then what do you think was the reason behind whoever asking about whether he can be controlled? Either you think that came up because of stuff in Minnesota and Chicago, in which case, why do you think Philly would care about that since he's in Philly now and they should have been able to judge for themselves, or you think it came up because of friction between Butler and one or more other Sixers players, in which case you agree with the person you just disagreed with.

He just came off a season clashing with a coach and his decision making and you’re still looking for the target for what that really means? Even if the 76ers kept Butler and fired Brown due to the lack of leadership and direction they would still want someone who can keep Butler “under control”. Butler even snapped back that no one can control him clearly a shot at leadership

And there you go, Butler mentions Brown wanting Simmons to handle the ball in the regular season as an issue. And the Embiid quote in the title is something about Simmons needing the ball I think?

[Pablo Escobar]

Last years Jimmy isn't taking the 76ers anywhere. Not sure why Simmons gets **** on for his performance, but Butler gets a pass.

He plays hard every possession. Even if he plays bad at least he tries. And you got Dray on your team so you know all about effort and how important it is.

[ReKon]

I am not sure bringing this up now does anything really.

At this point in time The Sixers were building towards Simmons being the man not Joel. Partly probably because they were not sure Embiid would ever be healthy enough to be the main man and probably because they expected that Simmons would eventually develop a jumper. With that in mind they made the only reasonable decision they could have made based on that.

Regarding the Jimmy Butler interview on JJ's podcast. How many times have you heard players actually talking about what is going on in the locker room? Jimmy gave as much information as he probably could but no NBA player will actually talk about what was going on in the locker room this openly. He is not giving 100% of the story obviously but is making it known that there were tensions about the roles.
The thing is that Butler only played there for essentially half a season. With time they would have probably figured out roles etc. If Simmons was adamant about him being the only ball handler no matter what then the Sixers had to go with it because as mentioned earlier it was going to be his team eventually.
But let's not act that the only reason he left was because he heard someone talking about "controlling" him. I think the moment Miami, a team with an established winning culture, a team well known for players putting in the work etc he was gone,, no matter what Philly offered him, because Miami essentially gave Jimmy what he was looking for since he left Minny (I can remember even in Chicago him and D-Wade talking about how the young guys were not putting in the work, which definitely would not be an issue in Miami).

What I don't appreciate about all this is that Embiid is taking a passive agressive shot at Simmons probably because of the article that came out saying that Simmons doesn't want to play with him anymore, or that he feels that their on court coexistence has ran it's course or whatever. This shows to me that there might be a lot of toxicity in the Sixers locker room, I wouldn't be surprised if it came out that players were split in 2 camps

[AussieCeltic]

Simmons was the first pick and jimmy was the last pick in the 1st round, so if anything Jimmy has exceded the expectations of him coming into the league, while ben really has been underwhelming since entering the league.

Yeh and? I never said anything about their expectations based on draft position and what they’ve done. I was originally replying to people saying Sixers would’ve won the championship with Jimmy last year which is laughable when he had even worse numbers than Simmons.

Of course I recognise Jimmy had worked his butt off to get where he is. Does that mean now he’s at this “star” level, we excuse him from poor performances? He’s been in the league 12 seasons. At this point in his career, he should be held to a higher standard than Simmons who has just turned 25.

I just thought it was a odd to compare their first 3 years in the league. Since simmons has been in the league for 5 years, played the last 4.

Simmons has gone from a very good rookie season to regressing in every stat except shooting % outside of ft%.

While Jimmy went from end of the bench guy to a starter avg 20ppg 6rpg 3apg 2spg in the same time as Ben has been active.

Jimmy did have a off playoff this year but that is the first time for him. Every player on the heat outside of bam was having a nightmare series vs the bucks.

While simmons has been pretty bad last 2 playoffs he has played in.

I dont think simmons will lead his team to the finals if he dosent improve his shooting, he might get to the finals but not as #1 guy.

He has shown nothing other then being a high maintenance primadonna.

My apologies, I meant to say first 4 seasons not 3.
Butler didn’t just have a bad series, it was historically bad. If we hold him to the same standards of others stars, heck even to the same standard of Simmons, he would be torn apart. But for some strange reason, he’s not.

Simmons has played in 5 playoff series.

He’s had 2 great series (Mia 2018/Brooklyn 2019), 2 ok series (Boston 18/Wizards 21) and 2 bad ones (Toronto 19/Hawks 21).

The thing is, even in those bad series, at least he’s giving you DPOY quality defense.

I agree he’s not the type of guy to lead you to a finals or championship, but he can be the number 2 guy. He’s still young, still one of the best players on one side of the ball and still elite on most aspects of the offensive side bar shooting. He’s 22/8/11 without Embiid in the playoffs with a 3-1 record.

Build a team around. Let me him play point/forward ala Giannis. Have guards/forwards that can create their own shot and offense in the half court (holiday/Middleton), give him a big who operates around the 3 (B.Lopez) and watch him flourish. He won’t be at Giannis level but he can certainly be a poor mans version of that which isn’t bad.

[IAMZOOTED2]

Yeh and? I never said anything about their expectations based on draft position and what they’ve done. I was originally replying to people saying Sixers would’ve won the championship with Jimmy last year which is laughable when he had even worse numbers than Simmons.

Of course I recognise Jimmy had worked his butt off to get where he is. Does that mean now he’s at this “star” level, we excuse him from poor performances? He’s been in the league 12 seasons. At this point in his career, he should be held to a higher standard than Simmons who has just turned 25.

I just thought it was a odd to compare their first 3 years in the league. Since simmons has been in the league for 5 years, played the last 4.

Simmons has gone from a very good rookie season to regressing in every stat except shooting % outside of ft%.

While Jimmy went from end of the bench guy to a starter avg 20ppg 6rpg 3apg 2spg in the same time as Ben has been active.

Jimmy did have a off playoff this year but that is the first time for him. Every player on the heat outside of bam was having a nightmare series vs the bucks.

While simmons has been pretty bad last 2 playoffs he has played in.

I dont think simmons will lead his team to the finals if he dosent improve his shooting, he might get to the finals but not as #1 guy.

He has shown nothing other then being a high maintenance primadonna.

My apologies, I meant to say first 4 seasons not 3.
Butler didn’t just have a bad series, it was historically bad. If we hold him to the same standards of others stars, heck even to the same standard of Simmons, he would be torn apart. But for some strange reason, he’s not.

Simmons has played in 5 playoff series.

He’s had 2 great series (Mia 2018/Brooklyn 2019), 2 ok series (Boston 18/Wizards 21) and 2 bad ones (Toronto 19/Hawks 21).

The thing is, even in those bad series, at least he’s giving you DPOY quality defense.

I agree he’s not the type of guy to lead you to a finals or championship, but he can be the number 2 guy. He’s still young, still one of the best players on one side of the ball and still elite on most aspects of the offensive side bar shooting. He’s 22/8/11 without Embiid in the playoffs with a 3-1 record.

Build a team around. Let me him play point/forward ala Giannis. Have guards/forwards that can create their own shot and offense in the half court (holiday/Middleton), give him a big who operates around the 3 (B.Lopez) and watch him flourish. He won’t be at Giannis level but he can certainly be a poor mans version of that which isn’t bad.

Don't wanna bud in where I'm not wanted, but "building a team" where Ben is the number 1 or 2 guy requires dudes like Middleton/Holiday/Lopez types of dudes. Guys like that arent really lying around waiting to get scooped up and few if any teams have the resources to get Ben and those other pieces needed. Then only team who cold even get close is Milwaukee and they already got their guy.

[Lockdown504090]

Sixers didn't get rid of Jimmy.

Jimmy left.

Brodie, the org got rid of anything and everything that made sense by keeping Ben Simmons, period.

Jimmy is the only player we should have kept and we compounded the error by signing Tobias

Harris’ contract was a monumental blunder

using the thinking embiid says philly is, tobias was the versitile stretch 4 that would give ben the room to work and be able to score..... if simmmons was a superstar right now, tobias would be worth the contract because his synergy with ben would be extremely difficult to stop and score against... but ben sucks and as a result tobias has a role he shouldnt and looks like hes an overpaid dirt bag.

[durka]

Damn, the gloves just came off. Gotta respect that Joel actually goes out and says it instead of hiding behind sources in an article.

If the Sixers get the type of underwhelming return it looks like they're bound to get for Simmons and take a step back this year, I wouldn't be surprised if Embiid also demands out next offseason. It sounds like he's been holding onto some serious resentment about getting rid of Butler and filling his salary slot with Horford and he's now onto the 4th front office regime of his time in Philly. How many more shots should they get to build a team around the most dominant C in the league?

[maradro]

Damn, the gloves just came off. Gotta respect that Joel actually goes out and says it instead of hiding behind sources in an article.

If the Sixers get the type of underwhelming return it looks like they're bound to get for Simmons and take a step back this year, I wouldn't be surprised if Embiid also demands out next offseason. It sounds like he's been holding onto some serious resentment about getting rid of Butler and filling his salary slot with Horford and he's now onto the 4th front office regime of his time in Philly. How many more shots should they get to build a team around the most dominant C in the league?

Seen a lot of posts with that sentiment, that embiid's candid statement is good..
Maybe for entertainment, but for the sixers locker room and even for him (in terms of protecting Simmons trade value) it's downright stupid to say that right now, I'd be pissed if I were a philly fan, just keep your mouth shut till he's gone

[One Last Shot]

My respect for Embiid just shot way up. He made a lot of good points and was brutally honest. You can tell this situation is really frustrating him.

Dude got swept in 1st Round without Simmons and average 8 turnovers the last 2 Games against the Hawks in Playoffs. Sure, that's frustrating & should pass the blame why they don't win. Embiid & Rivers deserved each other. Let's see how far they go without Ben this season.

[Tomjas]

Brodie, the org got rid of anything and everything that made sense by keeping Ben Simmons, period.

Jimmy is the only player we should have kept and we compounded the error by signing Tobias

Harris’ contract was a monumental blunder

using the thinking embiid says philly is, tobias was the versitile stretch 4 that would give ben the room to work and be able to score..... if simmmons was a superstar right now, tobias would be worth the contract because his synergy with ben would be extremely difficult to stop and score against... but ben sucks and as a result tobias has a role he shouldnt and looks like hes an overpaid dirt bag.

Tobias doesn’t operate as a stretch 4 on the Sixers

He favours the mid range which hampers Ben AND Joel

That’s why there’s been so many CJ for Tobi trade posts