The Sixer Sense
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Joel Embiid’s turnovers are his one nagging issue

By Christopher Kline

PHILADELPHIA,PA - NOVEMBER 1 : Joel Embiid #21 of the Philadelphia 76ers gets the crowd pumped up the Atlanta Hawks at Wells Fargo Center on October 25,2017 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania NOTE TO USER: User expressly acknowledges and agrees that, by downloading and/or using this Photograph, user is consenting to the terms and conditions of the Getty Images License Agreement. Mandatory Copyright Notice: Copyright 2017 NBAE (Photo by Jesse D. Garrabrant/NBAE via Getty Images)
PHILADELPHIA,PA - NOVEMBER 1 : Joel Embiid #21 of the Philadelphia 76ers gets the crowd pumped up the Atlanta Hawks at Wells Fargo Center on October 25,2017 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania NOTE TO USER: User expressly acknowledges and agrees that, by downloading and/or using this Photograph, user is consenting to the terms and conditions of the Getty Images License Agreement. Mandatory Copyright Notice: Copyright 2017 NBAE (Photo by Jesse D. Garrabrant/NBAE via Getty Images) /
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Philadelphia 76ers star Joel Embiid has one nagging issue on the offensive end — turnovers.

Joel Embiid is starting to return to form, averaging 20.5 points and 10.1 rebounds per game in under 28 minutes of playing time. He’s still operating under a slight minutes restriction, but remains an All-Star caliber player who impacts the game like few bigs can on both sides of the ball.

The brilliance of Embiid has always centered around just how minimal his flaws are. He’s one of the best defensive players in the league, but remains one of it’s most effective offensive bigs as well.  He’s even showing some promise as a playmaker out of the high post this season, an impressive development for somebody who was leaned on so heavily as a scorer last year.

Even with those improvements and unparalleled physical tools, though, Embiid does have one issue that continues to nag him: turnovers.

We don’t normally talk about turnovers unless it’s related to point guards, but Embiid has proven himself to especially turnover prone this season. Even with his flashes of court vision, a lack of awareness in the interior and some over-the-top dribbling spells hurt him on a nightly basis.

This is a very slight — and fixable — issue for Embiid, who’s a bona fide All-Star at this point in the season. But it’s something he needs to address to go from great to transcendentally great.

Here are the turnover rates for some of the league’s more notable centers:

NAME / MINUTES / ASSISTS / TURNOVERS

While Embiid doesn’t have the highest total here, there are a few factors contributing to Cousins’ total. Not only do the Pelicans rely on him heavily as a secondary creator, but he’s also playing almost 11 minutes more per game. That’s nearly another quarter of action each night.

Towns hasn’t assisted nearly as much as last season, but has trimmed down his turnovers down in the process. Jokic and Horford are arguably the best passers at their position, and have carved out some solid assist-to-turnover ratios that hover around that 2:1 mark.

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Embiid isn’t quite as pass-reliant as some of those names, which highlights where the issues lie. It’s those random isolation dribble sprees and tunnel vision post moments that end up causing him to cough the ball up.

It then boils down to Embiid working on his awareness. He needs to read the incoming double teams better and be more willing to kick the ball back out to the perimeter. The Sixers should give Embiid more straigt-up post touches when the offense slows down, but that comes with the assumption that he uses his physical gifts in a smart way — and understands that teams won’t stop him without bringing over that inevitable double team.

He’ll also need to cut back on the dribbling. While he’s as versatile as a 7-foot-2 behemoth will get, his ball handling isn’t tight enough to warrant heavy doses of it. He can take a couple of dribbles to gain positioning down low or carve out space from mid-range, but trying to go full-blown Andrew Wiggins won’t yield a very high success rate.

If Embiid can play to his offensive strengths more and become more aware of the defensive pressure around him, there’s little defenses will be able to do to slow him down. He’s far more effective in spot-up situations when it comes to shooting, while his frame gives him a virtually unmitigated advantage when avoiding those careless turnovers in the paint.

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Expect Embiid to continue his evolution as a player. He’s only 39 games into his Philadelphia 76ers career, so inexperience is still something he’s working through. This is only the beginning, and turnovers are one of the few hurdles left for JoJo to overcome.