Philadelphia 76ers: Reliving Joel Embiid’s 2018 bizarre Skills Challenge
As Joel Embiid finishes out his second straight All-Star weekend, let’s relive the Philadelphia 76ers starting center’s bizarre 2018 Skills Challenge.
Joel Embiid is the gift that keeps on giving for Philadelphia 76ers fans.
From his larger than life social media presence to his larger than life presence on the court, Embiid is the textbook definition of a ‘face of the franchise’ player, and thankfully, he loves our fair city as much as it loves him.
Calling Philly ‘his city‘ in a recent conversation with Israel Gutierrez, Embiid is the perfect representative to… well represent the City of Brotherly Love in this year’s All-Star game.
As one of the city’s three representatives, alongside Friday night’s World star Ben Simmons and Saturday Night’s in-arena host Christian Crosby, Embiid is quickly becoming an All-Star staple in the same vein as prime Shaquille O’Neal, who’s somehow still a fixture of the weekend to this day (that face).
However, while Embiid may be one of the most skilled players in the NBA, his appearance in the 2018 Taco Bell Skills Challenge was… weird.
Well, not per se weird, but definitely memorable in the most Embiid-y way (watch the full video here).
Sure, our boy breezed past Al Horford in the first round, a trend that Philly fans would love to see emulated in a regulation game (am I right?), but when facing off against Lauri Markkanen in the second round, the event’s eventual runner-up, he cheated pretty noticeably, literally throwing a ball away to move on to the next part of the challenge.
You can’t knock the hustle I guess.
Now his errant toss didn’t necessarily make or break the round, as Markkanen pretty easily bested ‘The Process’ down the stretch, but it did create one of the more memorable moments in one of the least memorable events to take place on All-Star weekend.
Next. Elton Brand is already the anti-Dell Demps. dark
Will Embiid ever take part in another Skills Challenge? Probably not, as he’ll more likely than not be focused on, you know, starting on the All-Star game (as one does), but we will forever be left the beautiful memory of his blatant cheating in 2018’s contest, a clip that will be meme-ified for the rest of time.