Joel Embiid and Ben Simmons clearly did not like each other towards the end of their relationship in Philadelphia. At the end of the day, it came across as though Simmons was giving up on his team, and Embiid did not like that one bit. With that being said, the two had a falling out, and once Simmons left for Brooklyn, Embiid started to look a lot happier.
Right now, Embiid is being considered for league MVP, and he looks a lot hungrier than he has ever been. While speaking to Melissa Rohlin of Fox Sports, Embiid noted that the Simmons situation had him looking in the mirror. It forced him to want to be the best player possible because he knew it was the only way Philly could stay afloat. Needless to say, Simmons woke something up inside of Joel.
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Per Fox Sports:
"When it started to become clear that the Ben Simmons spiral was irreversible, and he’d never play another game for the Philadelphia 76ers, Embiid took a long, hard look in the mirror.
'I just felt like, what are we waiting for?” Embiid told FOX Sports. “Obviously, that’s a big hole that we were missing. But I get paid to deliver. It doesn’t matter who is playing or not. If I don’t deliver on the court, fans are going to be mad. The front office, they’re not going to be happy. So it doesn’t matter whatever situation I’m in — I still got to go out there and deliver. I just looked at it like, I’ve just got to go out there and actually do it and prove it.'"
Now, the Sixers look like a team that could make a serious dent in the Eastern Conference. It is a wide-open conference right now, and if Embiid continues on his MVP pace, then the Sixers could very well make a whole lot of noise.
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