Few teams, perhaps none in the entire NBA, rely as heavily on one player as the Philadelphia 76ers do on Cameroonian center Joel Embiid, so much so that no player registered as a center had led the league in points, nor surpassed 30 per game, since Shaquille O’Neal did it with the 2000 champion Los Angeles Lakers.
When it was confirmed that Embiid would not play the first two games of the Eastern Conference Semifinals series with his team against the Miami Heat, it is likely that half of the 76ers’ chances of upsetting the top seed in the division are gone and with the South Florida team dominating Game 1, the reality is that the outlook is not at all rosy for the “City of Brotherly Love”.
How much does Joel Embiid’s absence weigh on the 76ers?
According to ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski, Embiid could be back for Game 3, perhaps already down 2-0 in the series and needing to win four of the next five games to advance to the Eastern Conference Finals, where the 76ers have not been since the now incredibly distant days of Allen Iverson.
Embiid is a well-deserved MVP candidate in the NBA along with Nikola Jokic of the Denver Nuggets and Giannis Antetokounmpo of the champion Milwaukee Bucks, that value for his team is clearly noticeable with his absence due to the orbital injury in the right eye and brain concussion in Game 6 of the first round series against the Toronto Raptors and Embiid is for the 76ers what Shaq was for the Lakers.
James Harden has not been the solution
The big difference, perhaps, is that Philadelphia clearly doesn’t have a Kobe Bryant to complement their big man, unfortunately, James Harden has outgrown that task, it could be his doom.
Marca
