Sixers' Joel Embiid Expected To Miss 2015-16 Season
By Ross Kelly
In news that was feared, but somewhat expected, Joel Embiid of the Philadelphia 76ers will undergo foot surgery and is expected to miss the 2015-16 season. Embiid, the #3 pick in the 2014 NBA Draft, also missed all of last season after having surgery in June 2014 to repair a stress fracture in his foot.
Shortly before last month's draft, the Sixers announced that Embiid's recovery from his first surgery had not gone as planned and he suffered a setback. From that statement from the team, there was an inkling that this would be more than a week-to-week injury and his season was at risk. Then came the draft and the team selected a player at the same position as Embiid in Jahlil Okafor. No one who's seen either of these players thought that the two could play together so it was pretty evident that the team didn't expect Embiid to suit up this season.
Not only is this news a setback for Embiid, it is a setback for the 76ers' franchise as a whole. As detailed here, Embiid was THE player the team wanted to build around, not Nerlens Noel, not Dario Saric, and not Okafor (whom they didn't even plan on drafting). The list of players who have missed 2 seasons due to injury and have returned to effective NBA players is, as you would expect, extremely short. Bill Walton missed three seasons in four years during his prime and returned to play five injury-plagued seasons as a role player. Sam Bowie missed back-to-back years in college and we all know about his underwhelming, injury-plagued pro career. The best case scenario for Embiid is probably Zydrunas Ilgauskas who missed 20 straight months of action due to a similar foot injury while in his early 20s. Big Z then returned to play 11 NBA seasons and was relatively healthy throughout them, in addition to being a 2x All-Star.
It will be interesting to see how this affects the Sixers' rebuilding plan. They took a risk with this revolutionary, multi-year plan and now it appears that it will blow up in their faces. This also means their three prized draft picks of Noel, Saric, and Embiid will have combined to miss FIVE NBA seasons by the end of this year.
Just nine more weeks until football season, Philly fans.
Ross Kelly is an Associated Producer for CBS Local Sports. He is from Louisiana and is a fan of all sports, but not of any teams (except LSU). He can be reached at ross.kelly@cbs.com.
