Within a Tuesday column on the Sixers‘ Ben Simmons dilemma, Jeff Zillgitt of USA Today cited a person with knowledge of the situation who said there’s a rift between Simmons and star center Joel Embiid that had been “escalating” leading up to this summer. However, in a tweet published on Wednesday, Embiid pushed back on that claim.
“Stop using my name to push people’s agendas,” Embiid wrote. “I love and hate drama. I love playing with Ben. Stats don’t lie. He’s an amazing player and we all didn’t get the job done. It’s on me personally. I hope everyone is back cuz we know we’re good enough to win.”
In the wake of Tuesday’s report that Simmons has told the Sixers he wants to be traded and doesn’t plan to report to training camp, we’ve got several more Simmons-related items to pass along today. Let’s dive in…
- A trade sending Simmons to the Kings might be a long shot, according to Jason Anderson of The Sacramento Bee, who hears that the Sixers would only be willing to consider a package that includes either De’Aaron Fox or Tyrese Haliburton. As we detailed on Tuesday, Sacramento is unlikely to part with either player.
- Any interest the Warriors might have in Simmons is “conditional,” according to Monte Poole of NBC Sports Bay Area, who suggests Golden State is hesitant to pair the three-time All-Star with Draymond Green, another strong defender who isn’t much of a scorer. Sources tell Poole that the Warriors are “divided” on the Simmons/Green fit, and that some people in the organization see potential in the pairing, while others believe having two non-shooters on the court would hamstring the offense too significantly. It’s also extremely unlikely that the team would move Green in a Simmons deal, Poole adds.
- Unlike other teams that have traded star players in recent years, such as the Pelicans with Anthony Davis or the Rockets with James Harden, the Sixers have no intention of landing in the lottery after trading Simmons, writes Derek Bodner of The Athletic, noting that Philadelphia finds itself in an unusual spot. New Orleans and Houston were willing to wait out ugly situations for months before trading their respective stars, and it will be interesting to see if the 76ers are willing to do the same with Simmons, who isn’t quite at the same level as a Davis or a Harden, Bodner observes.
- The time for “mutually beneficial maneuvering” seems to have passed for the Sixers and Simmons, per Kyle Neubeck of PhillyVoice, who says it’s now just a matter of seeing which side wins the stare-down.
Like I have been saying all along Simmons is very unlikely to be going to the Warriors unless its cheap which the sixers GM would never do. Longer sixers wait the less they will get for him. My bet is a team that is not a playoff contender will pick him up.
76ers asking price is sky high
Simmons for Draymond has been rejected by Warriors
Rumors updated
76ers don’t want anything Wolves and Kings offers
Now they are waiting for the 3rd team to offer assets
Ex
Beasley, McDaniel and other chip to third team
Never happened. This is beyond stupid.
W’s like Simmons alot. Their hesitancy has to do with Beals who could be available later. If not, W’s are willing to trade some of their young assets for Simmons…. As great as Draymond is, W’s fan should all acknowledge that Simmons is an upgrade over Green at this point of their career. Simmons is six yrs younger and healthier. W’s can include Green to keep some young assets for another upgrade later.
Would like take green, plus this years 2 first and like and additional 2 unprotecteds.
That trade was already rejected by Warriors. Simmons value has gone down. Simmons over Green is not much of a upgrade so why would the Warriors do that? Even though he is younger trading away 2 future players and draft picks make them worse in the future.
Simmons says he wants to go to one of the three big California teams. Where is the route to the Lakers or Clippers?
Westbrook is not available for trade until January 15.
How would Simmons be an upgrade? Sounds like more a distraction than anything else.
I’d do Wiggins and picks and nothing else 100% of the time, and worry about the fit later. Steph and Klay are on this team, its about getting them the ball and then getting back on D – both Green and Simmons are elite at that. Why wouldnt it work?
Simmons and green on offense leaves 2 defenders free, double steph and klay and let Simmons on draymond shoot mid range jumpers all day, anemic offense, go from the best 3 point shooters ever to relying on Simmons and draymond jumpers lol, even the retirement home that is the lakers would run them outta the gym
Everybody’s correct that Simmons can’t shoot outside of 18 ft, but 15 feet in he’s deadly and he’s 6-10 and he’s talented and can score with both hands. If you run out to the 2 starters who shoot then you’ve got three on three inside the line, with Looney rebounding, Green on top of the key and Simmons taking his man to the hole.
Simmons will have a field day in the key all by himself because you can’t lay off the two shooters.
Everyone says you can’t play Draymond and Ben Simmons together and I think that you have a short memory because Andre Iguodala and Draymond Green played together in crunch time. Andre Iguodala could hit the three occasionally but he wasn’t a marksman and Ben Simmons is way better with the ball offensively than Andre Iguodala ever was.
The most important thing is the defense so it’s win-win Warriors. Not sure why people always say you can’t play Draymond Green and Ben Simmons together. It would be a problem if Draymond Green was a post up power forward but he’s a Distributing power forward.
@Gary
These things are reseaachable. Simmons career FG% from 10-16 is only 29% and was 36% last year. From 3-10% he’s 41% for his career and 42% last year. His honey spot is 0-3 ft where he’s 71% for his career and 68% last year. He’s simply not a good shooter. Period. He’s damaged goods. He was given that contract HOPING he would improve and grow into the contract and he hasn’t.
Good stats find !! I think I’m just trying to justify bringing him in. I just see nothing but upside.
You haven’t watched him pass up layups in the playoffs and not work on his jump shot for years. He won’t work to improve his game even though he’s talented.
The best I can do
76ers get Hield, Haliburton and Harkless
Kings get Simmon and Maxey
Kings add a lottery protected pick
76ers tax free after the deal
That’s less than Philly would get in the Hawks deal that I proposed
Ben Simmons, Tyrese Maxey & the rights to Charles Bassey to Atl for DeAndre Hunter (or Cam Reddish), Danilo Gallinari (or Bogdan Bogdanovic), Onyeka Okongwu, Lou Williams, a 2022 2nd & a 2023 1st… what team can/will offer a better return than that?
Why would the hawks even do that ?? Why would they want to hurt their depth just to get Ben? How that make them better? Why would they wanna lose shooting for a guy who get assist and played D they have that already in young
They’re not hurting their depth by much. Still definitely be an extremely deep team. Dre is a beast & literally my favorite player on the team rn but Ben Simmons is a different level of player. Plus Dre is coming off an injury that he took awhile to come back from then when he did come back he had to sit out & have surgery again after only 10gms. Probably won’t be a long-term issue but he just has injury concerns that Ben doesn’t have. I’d hate to give up Okongwu he’s def gonna be a big time player in the league for probably over a decade. But I’m a BIG Charles Bassey fan & I think he’d be a really nice replacement for Okongwu. And even tho I see Okongwu as a very talented young big, I highly doubt he gets to the perennial all-star/top 20 player level that Ben has been at almost since his 1st days in the league. Ben is arguably the best defensive player in the world rn. It’s very obvious to me that a large amount of people don’t understand that & how important it is to his teams success. He’s also an incredible passer & can get a team numerous easy buckets every night bc he has the type of court vision & passing talent that very few other guys have. The Hawks will definitely be fine without him, which is sorta why I hesitate to give Philly our 2022 1st or Bogdan, but he definitely would bring us to another level. And Philly would drop a lil without him too, pretty much no matter who they get back. He’s obv not a shooter but John Collins is & those guys would make a perfect combo at forward to me. Ben has shown time & time again that he doesn’t have to shoot to help his team win. Hawks have plenty of shooters to put around him
My take is recency bias, based on what I saw of Simmons vs. the hawks. I heard loudly here and everywhere how simmons and the 6ers would stop Tre cold.
No such thing occured.
In fact, i am not sure that the 6th best hawk player, wasn’t better than Simmons (in the playoffs).
I get its a small sample size.
Still, to act like that didn’t just happen, is …
Nobody is ever gonna stop Trae but if anyone saw the Hawks run this postseason they know that the guy who gave Trae the most problems by far was Ben Simmons. Ben slowed Trae down more & guarded him better than Jrue, Bullock, Thybulle or EPayton. Casual fans focus on Ben’s struggles as a scorer & ft shooter in gm7 vs Atl but just go back & actually watch the game & it’s very clear to see that he was also shutting Trae down as a scorer & not for a lack of trying by Trae. Doc had Danny Green trying to guard Trae in gm1 & Trae destroyed him. Hawks probably win that series in 5 if they don’t put Ben on him the rest of the series. And obv it’s ridiculous to base your opinion of the guy on 1 series. I mean they played a series right before they played Atl lol that 1 counted too. Ben has played in numerous playoff series. You know recency bias isn’t a good thing to have right lol?
Well Ben can’t shoot and isn’t he terrible at the line . He just a over paid rondo at this point . Plus doesn’t help the team they have doc I can’t get past the second round rivers
He’s a much better scorer than Rondo, much better defender than Rondo. Also Rondo is a borderline HOFer with a couple of rings. Why don’t yall think stuff out before speaking?
But rondo not pay like a he a all star . He get paid what he worth. Ben is over paid . Don’t matter my point still stands he a similar player to rondo and my point is Ben over paid so who want his 30 mill for a guy who can’t shoot
Ben gets paid like an all-star bc he literally is an all-star & has been an all-star level guy for literally every yr of his career. Lol you say he’s similar to Rondo. Dude have you seen those 2 guys?. Ben is dam near a foot taller. There are some very obvious differences in their respective games. You clearly don’t understand what the word overpaid means lol. If Ben was a free agent he would have 30 teams begging him to sign for the max. The fact that he signed his current contract for the max salary allowable means by definition he’s underpaid. If not for the salary cap he’d be getting paid much more
@Sankara
it’s VERY debatable whether or not teams would give him a max contract if he was a FA right now. His deficiencies have been exposed. Sixers gave him that contract because they had to after selling their fanbase on the “process”. He’s a very flawed player.
Simmons + salary fillers PLUS a boatload of picks and swaps for Lillard. As soon as Dame demands it, it will happen. Portland should then move Simmons to Minnesota for more young player and picks. Portland is dead for the next few years in the West, they might as well look towards 2024 snd beyond.
Ya might want to just stick to baseball. Portland is NOT trading Dame for Simmons. Just purge that from your brain. If there was any desire for Simmons for Portland, they would have already traded CJ for him. Even if Dame goes nuclear and asks for a trade, Portland will demand more than Simmons and picks. If they did trade Dame, they aren’t going into a full rebuild a la OKC. Why would you if you still have Powell, Nurkic, CJ and Covington???
Simmons + Maxey for Siakam + Dragic + Flynn + Boucher + future lottery protected first.
Pretty sure Philly can’t get a better player than Siakam in any Simmons trade.
Getting DeAndre Hunter, Onyeka Okongwu, Gallo & Lou Will > getting Pascal, Boucher, Dragic & Flynn… Dre is still on his rookie contract for 2 more seasons, Okongwu for 3 more seasons.
I agree that Siakam is probably at the upper bound of talent that’s going to be available to them, but is he a fit with Tobias and Embiid?
Maybe, especially if this 3P% rebounds. But even still, that leaves them awfully weak in the backcourt. That’s going to be an issue if Maxey is part of the deal. Ideally, Maxey might be the answer at PG sans-Ben.
But if you ship out both you really need to get back a reliable PG. Maybe that’s Dragic, but at 35? I’d be weary.
Simmons already said he won’t play for Toronto. And with that powerful agent a trade to the Raptors is not going to happen.
@Gary
when did he ever say he wouldn’t play for Toronto or any other team for that matter.
Chris Broussard reported today that the rumor he only was interested in playing in LA or Bay area wasn’t true. They said he would play for any other team other than Philly.
Saw it online maybe even here on this site as well. Here’s one link but not sure how reputable…
**Per Jason Dumas on 95.7 The Game, Simmons’ relationship with the 76ers is so broken he isn’t returning Joel Embiid’s phone calls. Simmons is eyeing Golden State, and he trying to avoid getting traded to Portland or Toronto.**
@Gary
I wonder what he had against Toronto or Portland?
Portland maybe because they have Damian Lillard who handles the ball 80% of the time and Simmons wants the ball in his hands to facilitate. He doesn’t have a lot of fun just running up the court without the ball because he’s not really a reciever/scorer. Probably feels he wouldn’t fit well with Damian Lillard.
Toronto might be a good situation from our point of view but maybe it’s the Canadian taxes or something else we don’t realize? Also could be with Kyle Lowry gone he feels they’ve taken a step backwards?
Okay yes I just saw the Chris Broussard report from today saying he’ll play Anywhere.
Obviously a month ago he said “trade me hopefully to the California teams” or whatever.., and then just a day or two ago he told them “I’m not reporting, just trade me anywhere.”
Things change, situations are fluid. Good stuff.
and this is why I like Joel so much. good guy and willing to stand up to the media.
Love Joel’s message here
yeah and of course WIP is ANGRY at him for it, naturally
The condition is the trade is Wiggins and future picks and nothing else, and even then internally they cant see Ben turning quickly into Magic Johnson when having the Splash Bros at his disposal. I would love to see what a Looney-Green-Simmons-Thompson-Curry lineup would do, I bet it would win 70+.
Frankly, Sacramento’s unwillingness to include Halliburton OR Fox is a little befuddling. And I’m not a big fan of Ben Simmons.
Having said that, I mean, you have to give up *something* for him. Bagley and Hield isn’t going to cut it, even with Simmons’ stock plummeting.
I still like Sexton for Philly, personally. And even if Cleveland isn’t in love with Simmons, if they could get him for Sexton, who they’re probably going to lose anyway, then it seems like a worthy gamble.
Sacramento offers neither Tyrese Haliburton Nor Fox. Fox is unavailable and Halliburton plays good enough defense that bringing in Simmons for him doesn’t make much sense. Halliburton offensively is awesome so he’s not part of it either.
It’s going to be Buddy and Bagley and other stuff and three or four teams. Maybe the Raptors are involved but Simmons won’t go there.
Halliburton is worth offering if you believe Simmons just needs a change of scenery (I don’t but if you’re interested in Simmons I would think you would have to believe that…).
Fox and Simmons don’t seem like a great fit together unless Simmons is going all-in as a roll man.
I don’t think Buddy and Bagley have much appeal to many teams. Could see it being a 3/4 team deal. HIGHLY doubt Sacramento plays a role unless they offer up Halliburton or Fox
If I am a GM I wait it out. No team is beating down Sixers door to acquire him so why not wait and see the going rate drop. there are players available but are the sixers willing to take on future all stars?
Gary why do you think SAC will not give up Fox? The new GM drafted his position high the last two years.
Everyone is posturing now.
Marty nobody cares about your trade conditions. Get some action figures.
Fox is too darn good, he’s a foundation and someone to build on. Kind of like ja Morant in Memphis. Young point guard with amazing game.. you keep those guys.
One big reason could be because you have other guys you REALLY want to dump so a guy I like is not going anywhere.
There are 3 PGs to choose from. Fox is the one McNair did NOT draft. And presumably the one Philly would be most interested in, as the most ready player.
But Sacto has been investing so much into marketing him… To fans it would look like starting over again.
I put no confidence in McNair saying any are untradeable. Simmons trumps all, if it comes to that.
Kings are the best deal out there. Get it over with already. Sixers are a contender. And with right trade can win the East. So top the BS Morey. You’re an idiot who got Lucky with Harden. And have messed up every move since.
Karl-Anthony Towns, if the Warriors are going to give up everything for an asset. Simmons isn’t that guy