After the Philadelphia 76ers got off to a 2-11 start to the 2024-25 season, the team held a closed-doors meeting to clear the air and set the tone for what they hoped would be a turnaround.
Details of what was said in that meeting were leaked the next day, as we learned Tyrese Maxey challenged Joel Embiid over being constantly late and not setting the standard as the team’s star. Embiid was upset that became public knowledge, saying whoever leaked the info was a “real piece of shit” and vowed to figure out who did it.
In a profile by ESPN’s Dotun Akintoye on Wednesday, we learned Embiid knows who the leak is, and while he’s not willing to divulge that information, he made it clear that the trust has been broken and he won’t be participating in any future team meetings.
“I know who leaked it, but … the past is the past. The one thing I’ll say is, it’s hard being around people that do those sorts of stuff,” Embiid said. “That goes back to the trust thing. Once you cross that — you can’t expect me to be part of a team meeting again. That’s just not going to happen.”
Akintoye pressed Embiid on whether the player was still on the roster, and while Embiid was cagey, he said “there’s a chance they’re still around.”
The profile shows numerous examples of how the former MVP is quick to put up a wall with people when they break his trust — and how slow he is to let folks in again. Whoever leaked that team meeting nugget is now on the other side of that wall, and if it’s a prominent member of the team, managing that relationship will be an additional task on coach Nick Nurse’s plate.
Overall, Embiid’s relationship with the Sixers organization is a fascinating one. There’s both an understandable skepticism on Embiid’s part over how they’ve handled his injuries throughout his time there, yet a deep desire to deliver on the promise of his talents for an organization that has put so much of their hopes on him. Adding in a layer of distrust at the locker room level, when there are already tensions with Sixers management, is not exactly an ideal situation as all parties involved try to move forward and put a disastrous 2024-25 campaign behind them.
Philadelphia hopes Embiid, Maxey and Paul George can manage to stay healthy next year and fulfill the promise of their star power and push the Sixers to the top of an Eastern Conference in flux. At this point, they desperately need things to get off to a strong start. If not they’ll have to figure out how to straighten things out without Embiid’s participation in any future closed-door meetings.
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