The Lack of Theater in Philly

One of the problems that the 76ers have: they don’t have a theater.

The heat have Jimmy Butler, the Celtics have Jayson Tatum, the Warriors have Steph Curry, the Mavs have Luka Doncic. But, from my vantage point as a sports psychiatrist, Joel Embiid is not a leader of the Sixers. He’s too focused on himself. He whines a lot about foul calls often by throwing his arms up in the air. He also publicly trashes his teammates. Although they deserve it, he should not air dirty laundry in public. This was especially true of Harden after the playoffs. Marcus Hayes had an excellent article in the other days Philadelphia Inquirer about the immaturity that Embiid displayed when he tweeted something suggesting that he would like to join Butler on the heat “what you all need is another stor.”

What the Sixers need is a real leader like the aforementioned players. That is usually your best player, but in the Sixers case, unfortunately, that is not true. Daryl Morey has to fill the leadership void with a player who commands and demands respect to play along Embiid, or get fair value for him in a trade so that we have a leader. He is not a dominant center like Shaquille O’Neal. He’s not in the post enough to really dominate a game and inspire teammates with his leadership.

Yes, the Sixers would have a leadership conflict, like Shaq had with Kobe. But Philadelphia fans could live with that because, after all, the Lakers were winners.