The Ben Simmons saga with Philadelphia was finally in the rearview mirror after dominating the headlines most of last season when he was traded to the Brooklyn Nets. This season’s trade saga is headlined by Simmons’ new teammate Kevin Durant.
Philadelphia 76ers coach Doc Rivers was on The Vince Carter Show and revealed that Simmons didn’t leave the 76ers because of Rivers’ controversial comments about Ben not being a championship point guard. He believed it was based on experiences he had on the team prior to Doc signing. This could be a reference to Simmons’ fractured relationship with Joel Embiid at the time of his departure.
“That one comment [made after the Game 7 loss to the Atlanta Hawks in the 2021 Eastern Conference Semifinals] had nothing to do with why Ben wanted to leave. Let me just say that. It was a lot of things—as Ben told me, and publicly now—that happened long before I got there. What frustrated me was that I still think it shouldn’t have been enough to want to leave. I just didn’t. I told Ben that. I kept telling him that. ‘This is not why you want to leave the team. You work these things out.’ They didn’t get worked out.”
Doc went on to reveal that he had a long talk with Simmons after the trade had gone through. Rivers appreciated that Ben reached out and reiterated that he could have made the duo work.
“We’ve had one talk—a long, long talk—but we did have one good talk. Ben called me afterwards, which I thought was great, and we had a good talk. The point was he was already leaving and … listen, I really believe, even though 99 percent of the people didn’t, that we could make this work with Ben and [Joel Embiid] and the team. Because I’m built that way, that’s what coaches have to do.”
Considering how Embiid reacted to the news of Simmons being traded, it wouldn’t be a surprise to people that the relationship between the 2 players was not at the level of championship-level duos. Philly will hope James Harden can take them over the top in a way Simmons failed to.
