Get your brooms ready, Philadelphia 76ers fans; we’re going swe… actually never mind; I don’t want to jinx it.
On Friday, Sixers fans the world over were delivered a Mike Tyson-esque gut punch by way of one heck of a Woj/Shams bomb: Joel Embiid might have a torn ligament in his right thumb.
That’s right, after turning in an all-time performance in a game they could have lost on quite literally every possession, the Sixers took a game they never led into overtime and set themselves up for a game-winning shot with .8 seconds to go despite having watched their second-best player foul out in the final moments of regulation. That game, that .8 second 3, was done by a man with a (potentially) torn ligament in his dominant thumb?
*sigh* why does this always happen to us?
Stephen A Smith and the like called the Sixers’ championship hopes over, brutal Raptors fans cheered on the news as some weird revenge for Scottie Barnes’ ankle injury, and the general temperature of the fanbase was downtrodden, to put it mildly. But should they be? Should those dastardly Twitter trolls have their day, or could Philly still pull this out and make a run in an Eastern Conference playoff picture that had a good bit more parity than some expected two weeks ago?
As long as the Philadelphia 76ers have their best player on the court for 40ish minutes a night, I certainly won’t be betting against them.
The Philadelphia 76ers’ entire strategy is built around their should-be MVP.
Joel Embiid isn’t just a shooter. He isn’t just a scorer either, or a defender, or a shot blocker, or a playmaker, or even a rebounder. No, “The Process” is one of those rare players who can quite literally do it all – shoot, score, defend, block, make plays, rebound; all of it.
Why, you may ask, have the Sixers had so much trouble remaining competitive when Embiid leaves the court? Well, because it’s a whole lot easier to replace Tobias Harris, Tyrese Maxey, or even James Harden on the court for a stretch than Embiid because he’s such a singular focal point on both ends of the court.
The Sixers’ defense runs through Embiid, who anchors down the entire scheme both under the basket and even switched out onto anyone from Fred VanVleet, to Jrue Holiday, and even Trae Young. Their offense runs through Embiid, too, as he touches the ball an average of 1.72 times per minute over his current playoff run and scores an average of .4 points per touch, which ranks first on the team.
But wait, it gets better; Embiid is actually averaging 7.4 fewer touches per game during the playoffs than in the regular season on 5.8 additional minutes per game, and his points have only dropped from 30.4 to 27.3. That’s actually an improvement in terms of points per touch from .444 in the regular season to .576 in the playoffs and a good sign that Embiid’s efficiency hasn’t decreased even if Maxey currently leads the team in scoring following an incredible 38 point performance in Game 1.
Now don’t get me wrong, Embiid’s touch from beyond the arc will likely take a dip due to his injury, but JoJo is so multi-dimensionally talented that when you take away his ability to score in the paint, he gashes foes from the perimeter. When he gets trapped outside the restricted area, he becomes an elite screener and passer. Heck, Embiid hasn’t been able to be effectively hacked in years because he’s such an incredibly effective free throw shooter – teams can’t stop Embiid outright; they can only try to contain him.
So, will Joel Embiid’s injured thumb affect his game? Undoubtedly so, his taped-up digit will be front of mind when he goes for a rebound, puts up a shot, or attempts to snipe a ball out of the air for a momentum-altering block. But is “The Process” done and his team’s championship dreams extinguished? Hardly; he’ll just have to make adjustments and put his team in the best position to win as he has been all season long.