The Philadelphia 76ers came into the 2023-24 NBA season as one of the few contenders in the league, but their championship hopes took a massive hit when Joel Embiid suffered a knee injury that required surgery.
Against the Golden State Warriors, Jonathan Kuminga fell on Embiid’s leg and the reigning MVP immediately was in pain.
While Embiid hasn’t been ruled out for the remainder of the year, it will be months before he is able to play at full strength.
It’s unfortunate for Embiid and the 76ers as he was well on his way to repeating as MVP because of the scoring tear he was on.
The surgery also means that Embiid will be forced to miss the 2024 All-Star Game in Indianapolis this weekend.
The league had to find a replacement for Embiid in the All-Star Game and they settled on Miami Heat center Bam Adebayo via ESPN.
“Bam Adebayo has been named the starting replacement for the injured Joel Embiid in the All-Star game.”
Bam Adebayo has been named the starting replacement for the injured Joel Embiid in the All-Star game, per @ESPN690Jax pic.twitter.com/zKPkSBSHDf
— NBACentral (@TheDunkCentral) February 17, 2024
The Heat have been hovering around .500 for most of the regular season and sit in seventh place in the Eastern Conference, but that underscores the season that Adebayo is having.
The star big man has improved as a scorer and is more involved offensively on every possession.
Meanwhile, his defense remains outstanding in the paint and switching onto smaller players.
Adebayo is not the same level of player that Embiid is, but he’s more than capable of holding his own and is arguably an underrated player in this modern era of big men.
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