Ben Simmons tried to mend Joel Embiid relationship last summer

The Philadelphia 76ers are in a mess right now, with multiple injuries on their team and sitting at the bottom of the Eastern Conference. How they got to this point is indescribable, but it can all go back to the past years of the franchise and how they’ve maneuvered. Everybody remembers how the Ben Simmons situation went down in his final season with the team, as he and Joel Embiid couldn’t get on the same page after their loss to the Atlanta Hawks in the playoffs.

A lot of time has passed since then, but Simmons apparently reached out to Embiid last summer to try and mend their relationship, according to ESPN’s Ramona Shelbourne.

“But so much has gone wrong for Simmons and his former team in the years they’ve been apart that Simmons’ presence back in Philadelphia barely registered this time. He’d even reached out to Embiid and others last summer, league sources said, hoping to mend fences,” Shelbourne wrote. “Simmons, who is in the final year of his contract in Brooklyn, has shown how he can still impact a game with his passing, length and defense. But in the second quarter of the game Friday, he also missed the rim on a layup in a clip that quickly went viral — reminding everyone of how his time in Philadelphia went awry.

“Could they ever try to figure it out together again? One source called it unlikely, but stranger things have happened. Especially with the Sixers.”

Could Ben Simmons and Joel Embiid ever repair relationship?