Fact or Fiction: Joel Embiid and the Philadelphia 76ers are in for a painfully long season

Each week during the 2023-24 NBA season, we will take a deeper dive into some of the league’s biggest storylines in an attempt to determine whether trends are based more in fact or fiction moving forward.

Fact or Fiction: Joel Embiid and the Philadelphia 76ers are in for a long season

The NBA launched an investigation this week into one-time MVP Joel Embiid’s absence from the Philadelphia 76ers to start the season, according to ESPN’s Shams Charania. Apparently the league has as many questions as the rest of us about the 7-footer’s continued lack of availability, and for good reason.

Embiid missed each of Philadelphia’s six preseason games with what the team termed “left knee injury management.” He tore the meniscus in his left knee for a second time in January, requiring another surgery, which sidelined him until April, when he returned at less than 100% for Philadelphia’s playoff run.

He played for Team USA in the Olympics and reported to training camp on time, touting his weight loss. Perhaps we should have paid closer attention when Embiid informed us on media day, “Physically, I’m OK. I’m not where I want to be. … Until they feel like I’m ready to go, I’m sure they’re going to hold me back.”

Hold him back, they did. The Sixers issued a statement before their regular-season opener, suggesting Embiid is “responding well to his individualized plan and expected to ramp up his return-to-play activities this week, including scrimmaging.” He is expected to miss at least two more games to start the season.

In other words, nine months removed from a second surgery to his left knee, six months after he returned to the court, three months since playing in Paris and one month into the 2024-25 campaign, Embiid is beginning to get into game shape. This should not only set off alarm bells; it is a five-alarm fire.

Embiid is listed at 7 feet and 280 pounds. Believe it or not, according to Basketball Reference, only four other players in history that size have ever made even a single All-Star team: Shaquille O’Neal, Yao Ming, Andrew Bynum and Brook Lopez.

Bynum, whose career required multiple surgeries to both knees, retired at age 26. Yao retired five games into his age-30 season, needing a fifth surgery to his left foot. Though Lopez has managed to enjoy a long career, despite three surgeries on his right foot from 2011 to 2014, it was at age 30 he transitioned to a lower-usage role for self-preservation, signing for the bi-annual exception in 2018.

Only O’Neal carried his dominance into his 30s. He did not have a single major surgery in his 20s. He was coming off three straight championships (and Finals MVPs) at age 30, leading the NBA in Player Efficiency Rating each season. He would win a fourth title with the Miami Heat at age 33, as injuries began to erode his impact, and he was never again the same, playing for four different teams in his final four seasons.

A reminder: The Sixers just granted Embiid a three-year, $192 million contract extension, which will pay him almost $70 million — one-third of the projected salary cap — at the age of 34 in the 2028-29 season.

Philadelphia is banking on Embiid becoming The Next Shaq. There were also questions about O’Neal’s conditioning at 30, but at least we had evidence of what was possible with him at the helm — a dynasty. He did not miss a single playoff game in his 20s. Embiid has never finished a season in good health.

We also have ample evidence that Embiid is closer to the end of his career — or at least nearer to transitioning into a different phase — than he is to anchoring a championship team. Take a look at that chart again. Outside of Bynum, who, again, was four years retired by this point of his career, Embiid logged the highest usage and lowest availability of anyone his size in his 20s. He turned 30 in March.

And we expect him to get better when he is already sidelined to start this season? In addition to resting him for the first week of the 2024-25 campaign, the plan to prepare Embiid for a healthy playoff run is to keep him from playing another 15 back-to-back games. It will also feature “periodic time off during the regular season and routine evaluations from doctors and the 76ers’ medical staff,” Charania reported.

The one thing we learned from Philadelphia’s opening-night loss to the Milwaukee Bucks: The Sixers are far from a contender in Embiid’s absence. They looked like a team that is still trying to figure out who it is when the face of their franchise is not on the floor, as if they have not had ample opportunity to prepare. It does not matter in the end, because who they are without Embiid is of no relevance to the title race.

So the Sixers will spend the season vacillating between a team that runs through its oft-injured 7-foot, 280-pound behemoth and one led instead by a 24-year-old Tyrese Maxey. The version of the 76ers sans Embiid finished last season with a 16-27 record and was outscored by 12.6 points per 100 possessions.

In what world is this a good plan? It is not; it is just the only plan available to them. And it is one that also relies on the health of Paul George, a 34-year-old who joined Embiid on the injury list to start the season.

George’s 74 games last season were an anomaly. He missed 40% of his games in his previous four seasons with right shoulder, left hamstring, right foot, right elbow, right hamstring, right knee, left groin and left knee ailments. George, who signed a four-year max contract with the Sixers in the offseason, hyperextended his left knee in the preseason, suffering a bone bruise.

Again: This will get better at age 34, as he opens the season with an injury? He, too, will likely miss back-to-back games this season in addition to his absence to begin the year. At best the Sixers will have their full complement of stars for three-quarters of the season, preparing one team to contend for a title and another to prevent them from falling in the standings, as they did last season, all in hopes of hitting the ground running every other night for the entirety of the playoffs. No team would ever ask for this.

Except for the Sixers, who just signed up for four more years of it.

Determination: Fact. Joel Embiid and the 76ers are in for a long season.