The appreciation of Joel Embiid is one of the best litmus tests to determine who is a casual and a real NBA fan. For quite some time now, the Philadelphia 76ers star has become the target of nonsensical narratives, most of which revolve around his seeming inability to get his own team over the hump despite posting MVP numbers season after season, year after year.
Despite what his haters have to say, the major suspect behind his lack of success in the postseason is something completely out of his control. Injuries have prevented him from fully unleashing himself in the playoffs — so much so that he recently said he would “sacrifice his Most Valuable Player award to get a fully healthy run in the playoffs.”
Embiid fully believes that he is dominant enough that even just one fully healthy run in the postseason would allow him to get the 76ers to the biggest stage. If we are being frank, there is no tangible precedence to back that up, but there is likewise nothing that points to him being unable to accomplish what he is saying.
Joel Embiid says he only needs one healthy playoff run to get the 76ers over the hump
As former head coach Brett Brown said just recently, it was unfortunate that he never got to experience having a healthy Joel Embiid in any playoff run when he was still at the helm for the team. That is the main reason why the 76ers, despite being one of the winningest franchises in the league during the regular season for nearly a decade, have yet to even sniff a Conference Finals berth.
That makes all the criticisms on Embiid’s lack of postseason success completely arbitrary and off-target. People disregard context all the time just to satiate their daily thirst to get off a potential hit on social media, which has perpetuated this notion of Embiid being a regular season wonder with nothing to show for it in the playoffs.
Despite his career-altering injuries, Embiid has found a way to remain absolutely dominant, especially on the offensive end. When healthy, he is still a Top-5 talent in the league, and there is literally no player who can truly slow him down in one-on-one situations.
That is the kind of talent any championship aspirant needs to have on their ball club. The 76ers have on in Joel Embiid, but again, it is always a matter of staying healthy for him. Hopefully, the franchise gets to revel having him at peak capacity come April.