It’s no secret the number one key to the 76ers marching down Broad Street in June is Joel Embiid. The big guy needs to be in tip-top, MVP caliber form for the Sixers to for that to happen.
Something that will always be an area of importance is Embiid’s conditioning, whether it’s in regard to his shape or health, or both. It’s totally understandable if you’re worried about that holding up over an 82-game season, plus two months of playoffs. But, through two days of training camp, so far so good.
“I think it was excellent,” head coach Brett Brown said after practice Wednesday. “We do what we do with the load management stuff, but as far as watching the drill—and we get up and down the floor—he did it just fine. Like he wasn’t calling for a sub.
“I thought his wind was excellent. And to his credit, he obviously has done a lot of work to lose that amount of weight—because we all can go on a diet—but to all of a sudden come out and apply your weight with your cardio and have a base with wind, that’s the holy grail. And he did it. He obviously did it, because I don’t see anything else but his ability to get up and down the floor without calling for a sub.”
“It was good,” Embiid said Tuesday following the first practice. “Obviously it’s going to take some time to get back on track and get back to the flow of the game because of limited action during the summer, but it was good…I felt great.”
Because Embiid was rehabbing his bothersome knee in the off-season, he didn’t get to do enough running up and down a floor. None the less, he still lost 20 pounds heading into camp. At one point it was 25, but he put five back on, claiming it was muscle.
The key for Embiid, and this Sixers, this season is to formulate an effective and appropriate load management plan to make sure the big guy takes off the correct amount of games—not too much, and not too little.
Last year, he played too much prior to the All-Star break, and not enough afterwards. Albeit he got sick in the playoffs at the worst possible time, he still wasn’t in the type of form he needed to be in to go on a championship run.
“I try to make them understand that we got to stay consistent,” Embiid said Monday at Media Day. “Like them finding a way for me to miss a game because we have about two or three days off is not a good idea because three or four days without doing anything is a lot.”
Like last season, Embiid wants to win MVP and Defensive Player of the Year. The only way those will happen is if the 76ers clinch the top seed in the East, and the only way for that to occur is if Embiid is dominate throughout an 82-game schedule, and not just a portion like he was in 2018-19.