Paul George pauses podcast for 76ers' play-in push

George announced that the latest episode of "Podcast P with Paul George" would be his last for the immediate future. He plans to remove the headphones and step away from the microphone to focus all his attention on basketball.

"I plan to take a break from the pod just to focus on getting my body right, getting mentally right," declared George, explaining that he wanted his team to "give ourselves a chance to be in contention to compete for a championship."

A chance to be in contention to compete is a modest ambition but perhaps appropriate for a 20-38 76ers team that went into the season with championship aspirations but now has the NBA's sixth-worst record. George has been a part of the disappointment, missing 18 games due to injuries while his scoring has dropped from 22.6 to 16.4 points per game.

At the same time, "Podcast P" has 784K subscribers on YouTube and nearly a quarter of a million followers on Instagram. It's one of the most successful NBA player podcasts, particularly for active NBA players.

However, George has been criticized for thriving as a podcaster while struggling as a player. On Sunday's "The Bill Simmons Podcast," co-host Ryen Russillo ripped George, saying, "He's so bad right now that I can't even believe he's doing podcasts...I would be so embarrassed."

Now that George is suspending podcasting to focus on basketball, the question remains: why did it take him so long? If the podcast truly is a distraction, then why did it take until the end of February for George to stop, especially when he's being paid over $49M to play basketball?

According to NBA writer Stephen Noh of the Sporting News, George's numbers improved in games after he dropped podcast episodes.

Shockingly, the season isn't completely lost for the 76ers. They're still only 2.5 games out of the last play-in spot. None of the teams they'd have to beat in the play-in tournament even have winning records. George and Tyrese Maxey were both All-Stars the previous season and should be able to improve.

It's possible George already is. In his first post-podcast game Wednesday night, George scored 25 points in a loss to the New York Knicks, his first 25-point performance in over a month. But George will likely still have plenty of free time to devote to podcasting when the NBA's regular season ends.