TORONTO — Before Game 5 even tipped off, you could tell something was very, very wrong. Joel Embiid took the floor at Scotiabank Arena for his pregame warmup looking obviously drained, his face flush, his left arm wrapped at the site where a needle — ostensibly one to insert fluids intravenously, as he had before Game 4 — had previously been inserted. The signature smile and effervescence that has made him such an endearing superstar was completely wiped away.
Anyone who has given the series an even passing glance knows why. Embiid has been sick for the past two games, dealing with an illness that has been called a few different things. Prior to Game 2, he was dealing with the stomach flu. After Game 4, it was described as flu-like symptoms. Before Game 5, it was called an upper respiratory infection. However it’s described, it’s evident that Embiid is a shell of himself — following Game 5, Brett Brown said his star center has been kept in bed due to a “significant temperature” over the last few days.
It all led to what might be the worst playoff performance of Embiid’s career at the worst possible time. The Philadelphia 76ers fell to the Toronto Raptors, 125-89, to find themselves in a 3-2 hole with the series shifting back to the City of Brotherly Love for a crucial Game 6 on Thursday. A full-blown race against the clock is on during the lead up to that game to get Embiid healthy, because if he replicates his 13-point, 8-turnover, 6-rebound outing from Game 5, the Sixers are going to get the opportunity to enjoy the lovely springtime weather in Philadelphia way before they’d wish.
“I think you go back to Philadelphia and we can sorta recalibrate the things that we did well, get Joel a little bit more healthy, hopefully a lot a bit more healthy, and play in front of our fans,” Brown said after the game. “I think we’re gonna be okay. We’re going to be just fine if we can walk down and do the things we know we can do. There’s no dent to our spirit.”
Philly is a talented bunch and there are plenty of areas they can improve. Tobias Harris and J.J. Redick could hit some more shots, Jimmy Butler can get a little more efficient, and Ben Simmons would be wise to start making a positive impact on offense, but it all comes down to Embiid. He is, quite literally, at the center of everything. The team goes as he goes, and when he can’t get out of second gear, the Sixers often suffer the same fate.
“It sucks,” Embiid said about playing through the illness. “I know I gotta do a better job for us to win, gotta do the little things. When I’m needed to score the ball, I gotta show up, setting screens, I gotta do a better job of rebounding the ball. That’s on me. Can’t control my physical condition, but I can also control how much I push myself, and I try to do that, but I just gotta do more. ”
The situation Embiid finds himself in is awfully awkward. He needs rest, he needs to get whatever bug is in his system all the way out, and he needs to be as close to 100 percent as his body will allow at this point in the NBA calendar if the Sixers want to compete for a championship. The problem is that taking a game off is both not on the table and not in Embiid’s DNA.
It sometimes get lost in the fact that he can enjoys being a silly guy, but part of what makes Embiid the kind of player Philadelphia can build a team around is he’s a ruthless competitor, the kind of guy who will take the floor despite, say, an illness that had him bedridden for days. This didn’t go unnoticed by his competition, as Raptors forward Serge Ibaka mentioned after the game.
“He was playing, he was trying to play hard, help his team get [a] W,” Ibaka said. “I think we just do a great job as a team to make everything tough for him. Every time he’s catching the ball in the post we made sure he had to work for every basket.”
Give Ibaka and Marc Gasol credit, as Toronto’s bigs really did make Embiid work. This, of course, is something you’d rather not do when you’re sick. Embiid knows he has to respond by finding ways to impact a game — “Quick moves, duck-ins, set screens for Tobias, help Ben and J.J., help them get freed up, do the little things” — but as long as he’s under the weather, that’s going to be a problem.
Well, that’s not entirely true. Embiid is good enough that, as he said, he is capable of heeding his teammates’ advice of giving it is all for the two and a half hours that he needs to step on the court. What is more important may be that he Embiid just isn’t having fun. There’s an inherent joy that comes from watching Joel Embiid when he’s at his best, it was on display during Game 3, a Sixers blowout win that featured the big man’s best game of the series.
To top it all off, Embiid threw down a windmill dunk, then flew up the court with his arms extended and a smile from ear to ear.
JOEL EMBIID!!!!!! https://t.co/5dMYGjgi1e
— Dime (@DimeUPROXX) May 3, 2019
That moment, right there, is Embiid at his best. It’s not because he dunked or because he celebrated, but rather, it’s because he found joy on the basketball court. When that happens, the Sixers might be able to beat anyone. When it doesn’t, you get something like Tuesday night. The good news for Philadelphia, at least, is Brown said after Game 5 that there’s no “woe is me” mindset in the locker room, and while the Raptors found a way to punch them, he believes there’s a resiliency about this group to punch back. Brown also understands the importance of having a healthy and happy Embiid — he was a bit peeved at some of the criticism his center came under for his performance, saying “I think it’s grossly unfair, some of the criticism that he gets, I don’t understand that.”
Embiid has been getting this love from all over the place in recent days. He praised his teammates for the push they provide, and is thankful for texts that he gets from Brown checking in on him. In his eyes, it’s as heartwarming as it is motivational, and once Game 6 rolls around in Philadelphia on Thursday, he wants to reciprocate this love.
“I know that we gotta go back to Game 3, the same energy, gotta have fun,” Embiid said. “That’s one of the keys of me playing so well, the whole season, this postseason, is just about … I gotta smile on the court, I gotta lift my teammates up. I shouldn’t care about offending anybody, I just gotta be myself and not really care and just do whatever I want to.
“At the end of the day, that’s how I dominate,” Embiid continued. “If you see me smile, that means I’m doing what I’m supposed to do, and I intend to be doing that in two days.”
