Joel Embiid appears to have reached basketball nirvana, and he can’t help but reflect on how far his team has come since just a few years ago.
After the Philadelphia 76ers defeated the New York Knicks on Wednesday to improve to a perfect 3-0 in the James Harden era, Embiid spoke on all the ups and downs that he has gone through with the team. He also got in another jab at former 76ers GM Bryan Colangelo for good measure.
“I’ve been through a lot,” said Embiid, per NBC Sports Philadelphia. “Whether it’s, you talk about, you know, freakin’ GMs using burner accounts, talking trash on their players.”
Embiid also noted the firing of Brett Brown, whom Embiid says he thought would be his coach for the rest of his career, as well as the significant roster turnover for the team since Embiid was drafted in 2014.
You may recall that Colangelo, who was Sixers GM from 2016-18, was caught in an embarrassing scandal where he allegedly used burner Twitter accounts to diss the team’s own players. While it turned out that it was not actually Colangelo who was behind the accounts, the faux pas still led to his downfall as he ended up resigning from his post. Embiid also took plenty of shots at Colangelo at the time of the scandal.
These days, however, Embiid, who is now the longest-tenured player on the 76ers, finally has a co-star in Harden who seems to mesh perfectly with him, putting the team in a position to get over the hump in the East at long last. Thus, it is safe to say that the Sixers have come a long way since having to worry about egg profiles on Twitter.
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