If Joel Embiid is on the court, he and the 76ers can dominate, regardless of the opponent. Thus, I'd estimate that the majority of 76ers fans would point to Joel Embiid's health as the key factor in keeping the team's title chances alive as the playoffs continue. But according to Stephen A. Smith, with or without Joel Embiid, the 76ers have another major hinderance in their ability to win a championship this season.
That would be Ben Simmons' shooting, or better put, his lack of. The broken record that keeps on spinning and coming back up again, and again, and again. And a problem that Philly fans probably wish would just go away, vanish, disappear.
Smith joined the "Takeoff with John Clark" podcast and dug into Simmons' issues.
"Philly, to me, is limited offensively because of Ben Simmons, and if you recall, I said this preseason — and I told Doc Rivers to his face when I was interviewing him — Ben Simmons is the reason this team will not win a title this year. I truly believe that," Smith said.
And it's that issue and that issue alone that Smith thinks will keep Philly from being able to top intimidating opponents like the Brooklyn Nets, who Smith doesn't think will be beaten by anyone if their big three of Kevin Durant, James Harden and Kyrie Irving are all able to take the court together. The only teams Smith sees as having a foreseeable shot, should Harden be sidelined, are the Utah Jazz and the Los Angeles Clippers.
But we don't care about that, at least not in this article. What we care about is Simmons and that anti-shooting mentality, and what the Sixers, if anything, will be able to do about it.
"I think you just get Ben Simmons in the gym. I'm gonna put this out here: I think it's an issue of work ethic. I really, really do," Smith said. "I'm not calling him lazy. I'm not trying to cast any aspersions on his character. He's a good kid, you know, he cares, he goes out there and I think he's an elite player.
"But in the offseason, you can't tell me he's working on his jump shot. There's no way. When you won't even attempt them during the season, when you won't even attempt them when you're playing for this team, you're clearly not working on it enough. I don't give a damn what you're doing in the offseason, it's not enough."
It's not the first time that Simmons' work ethic in improving his game has been questioned, and it certainly won't be the last. But the subsequent bold proclamation from Smith, if you agree with him, should make you a little bit more intrigued about the possibility that Simmons' shot could improve. Because we all wonder whether or not it will happen, but what if we ponder what the Sixers will look like when it does happen?
"Somebody has to get him and focus on him becoming some semblance of a perimeter threat. That's all that's missing," Smith said. "He has everything else. He's got height, he's got size, he's got strength, he's got speed, he's got power, he's got athletic ability, he's got a tenacity on the defensive side of the ball. There is literally not one, single other weakness in his game other than his inability to shoot the basketball beyond five feet.
"That's his problem. He resolves that, the Sixers will win a title within the next three years. A championship returns to Philadelphia if Ben Simmons works on that part of his game."
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