The Joel Embiid and Ben Simmons era in Philadelphia was supposed to take the Sixers to the top of the NBA world. They were two of the best young players in the league when they started playing together and to be fair to them, lifted the Sixers from the basement to become a perennial playoff team.
They would never have much success in the postseason, however, as they failed to even make it past the Conference Semifinals. Tensions boiled over in the 2021 playoffs against the Atlanta Hawks when Embiid and head coach Doc Rivers, basically threw Simmons under the bus after they lost the series. Simmons didn’t take it too well and never played another game for the team.
Danny Green Reveals How He Tried To Keep The Peace Between Joel Embiid And Ben Simmons
There was a brief period during the 2021 preseason when Simmons returned to practice but it was clear that the situation was very delicate. During a session, Embiid had Simmons defending him and Danny Green revealed on his Inside The Green Room podcast that he decided not to pass the ball to him, as it might have led to some problems.
We hope you kept the peace with your families during the #Thanksgiving holiday like Danny tried to do with the #Sixers 🤣
Full episode — https://t.co/PAIiGqsGcJ pic.twitter.com/nzRlvXbwFD
— Inside The Green Room (@GreenRoomInside) November 25, 2022
I had the opportunity to give Joel the ball against Ben. For the sake of keeping the energy well, I swung the ball across the floor away from that matchup because I don’t know what Joel–because Joel is known to have some chippy plays in him as you have seen throughout his career. He’s not the one to back down anything or to hide his feelings or emotions and I know there was probably some frustration with him and who knows how it would have came out during that play, but I thought it was smarter and safer for us as a group to try and keep–if we were trying to bring him back–to move the ball to the other side of the floor. Had I thrown that ball into Joel? Ben and Joel had matched up? I really wish I had thrown the ball in and to see what would happen.
It probably would have gotten a bit feisty. All of this didn’t matter in the end though, as Simmons didn’t want to be a part of the group and was eventually traded to the Brooklyn Nets.
He finally played against his old team in Philadelphia for the first time recently and was greeted with boos and abuses, which wasn’t a surprise to anyone. Simmons did, however, take a shot at the fans by saying he expected the boos to be louder. Knowing Sixers fans, they’ll definitely try to live up to his expectations next time around.
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