Philadelphia 76ers: Simmons avoids the Kardashian Curse in do it all loss

In an incredibly undermanned effort, Ben Simmons showed off why he’s one of the league’s best young players in the Philadelphia 76ers 87-105 loss to Boston.

In the first game of the 2018-2019 NBA season, Ben Simmons was on the court for 43 minutes.

There are only 48 minutes in an NBA game.

While we all had to assume that Simmons would play early and often for the Philadelphia 76ers after winning the 2018 Rookie of the Year award a few short months ago, it’s clear Big Ben isn’t just one of the two best players on his team, he’s one of the best players in the entire NBA period.

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Forget the Fresh Prince, if this man can find an outside shot, we could be looking at the new King of the Eastern Conference, a moniker that I’m sure his good friend and mentor LeBron James would happily pass on.

However, until that day eventually starts to fall, his shot is going to haunt him.

Though Simmons finished the 76ers’ eventual loss just two assists short of a triple-double, his lack of a polished jump shot, let alone a real 3-pointer, once again was on full display on a national stage, especially at the foul line. Of his 11 shots from the ‘charity stripe’, Simmons only made five, good for a downright ugly free throw shooting percentage of 45, a mark even worse than last season’s 54 percent mark.

On a night where virtually the entire team struggled to knock down shots, with no player recording more than two 3-pointers, Simmons poor performance at the line simply could not be ignored.

Now granted, those six points didn’t sink the Sixers, as the team lost by almost 20 points to their ‘rivals’ the Boston Celtics, but it may be the bitter taste that remains following a truly ugly game.

But frankly, it shouldn’t.

In a game without Mike Muscala and Wilson Chandler, Simmons took matters into his own hands and performed double duty for the team, playing point guard one minute, and power forward the next, especially once Dario Saric fell into foul trouble. After being eased into his eventual role as a do-it-all playmaker last season, Simmons provided glimpses of the player he can eventually become, one capable of covering opposing players 1-5, while also being able to score on opposing players 1-5.

Once that shot starts falling, Simmons will be unstoppable.

So, with the 76ers now 0-1, the team will return to Philadelphia to open up the season at the Wells Fargo Center against the lowly Chicago Bulls.

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While neither of these games will go on to define the Sixers’ 82 game season, if his performance against the Celtics is of any indication, it would appear that Ben Simmons has successfully avoided the Kardashian Curse, and could be ready to take another step toward NBA supremacy.