It’s been 212 days since Ben Simmons’ last appearance for the Philadelphia 76ers, with the 25-year-old still at odds with the team’s front office.
Simmons, who signed a $170 million (A$236 million) deal, has not scored more than a single second of court time this season as he refuses to play, and remains absent from a variety of team events.
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Executives at The Sixers have made their position clear on exactly what they want in any business deals with Simmons, an All-Star caliber player heading to City of Brotherly Love.
Tuesday, January 18
Tuesday January 18
While they wait to get close to the perfect deal, Simmons continues to drag its feet and wait for a new team to call home.
Given the long absence from play, some felt the Melbourne native would eventually bite the bullet and return to play.
But according to ESPN NBA star Ramona Shelburne, that’s not a mentality Simmons entertains.
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“Meaning, if it takes the whole season to trade it, if it takes the Sixers all year to find a deal acceptable to them, he’s ready for it,” Shelburne said. ESPN.
“It seems inconceivable to think that a player who is still fined for every match, for every training, for every weightlifting session he misses, as of the January 15 salary he received, is still being fined hefty.
“It’s fine if it lasts the whole season, if that’s the case.”
despite this, Athletic Sam Amick thinks the Sixers are likely to trade Simmons before the deadline.
As for the question ‘Will the deal expire before the deadline?’ “For whatever reason, the mood among every team I spoke to was that the answer would probably be yes, and that something would likely happen before the deadline,” Amick said. gastroenteritis blues Audio notation.
“I haven’t heard that from The Sixers, so then you’ll believe it, but we’ll have to wait and see.”
Without Simmons, the 76ers sit sixth in the Eastern Conference.
We’ll never know what they’ve been like this season with Simmons on the court, but with superstar Joel Embiid up front, that has forced the other players to step up.
Speaking after the Sixers’ 11-point win over the Miami Heat on Sunday (AEDT), Embiid emphatically declared the team “has everything we need here,” and Shelburne felt it was an expressive statement proving the team had nearly an edge over Simmons.
“That’s where we got into the chicken game,” Shelburne said. “They say the same thing.
“We have everything we need here,” Joel Embiid was quoted as saying after the match.
“This is the heck of a statement. We have everything we need here” — in other words, I wouldn’t pressure my organization to find a solution with this Ben Simmons trade.
“Because honestly, if you watched Joel Embiid in the last 30 days, he’s been one of the best players in the league… and it came true. [with him]And I said, “What do you mean by that?”
And he adds, ‘I actually love the challenge of winning with these guys. I believe in these guys, and I love this challenge now.
“We will see if anyone flashes here. But for now, they are in it for a long time.”
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