Sixers’ Joel Embiid to miss fifth straight game; Johni Broome suffers meniscus tear

Joel Embiid will miss his fifth straight game for the Sixers on Sunday, with the team ruling him out for their meeting with the Minnesota Timberwolves in Sunday’s 2 p.m. injury report.

After missing the final two games before the All-Star break with what the team dubbed right knee injury management, Embiid picked up a second designation of right shin soreness that has troubled him over the past week. That issue was first revealed in a previous update from Wednesday, February 18th, before Thursday’s post-break meeting with the Atlanta Hawks:

While participating in a right knee injury management program during the All-Star break, Joel Embiid repeated soreness in his right shin. Following a consultation with doctors, Embiid has received daily treatment while progressing through on-court work and strength and conditioning. He will be out of tomorrow night’s game vs. Atlanta and reevaluated ahead of the team’s back to back this weekend.

—Sixers spokesman

Ahead of their meeting with the Hawks, Nick Nurse answered several questions about Embiid’s health, indicating that he probably would be available to play if the Sixers if it had been a playoff game. In addition, Nurse indicated that he believed the knee was a lesser problem than the shin, though he has been listed with both issues this weekend. Those questions and answers follow below:

REPORTER: Do you expect he’s going to miss extended time?

NURSE: The doctors don’t want to play him tonight, the plan is to get him on the court [Friday], see how he looks tomorrow, and I think we just go from there. I don’t anticipate it being a long time; I’m pretty optimistic about it. But we’ll see what they come up with and see where it ends up tomorrow.

REPORTER: If today were a playoff game, what do you think the likelihood is he would play?

NURSE: I can’t overspeak with what the doctors would say, but I would tend to think he would play. But I can’t overspeak what they’re saying. I actually have I’m preparing this game and players and all this stuff that’s going on, doctors do their thing, they tell Simon, Simon tells me and I know who’s available and we go from there. Tomorrow, off day or whatever, he comes in and works out and we go through it again, might be a little bit more involved, I would probably say he would play if it was a playoff game today but I can’t speak for Joel or the doctors.

REPORTER: Is your understanding that Joel’s knee got better enough that he would have played if not for the shin soreness?

NURSE: I think so, yeah. Not 100 percent sure on that, but I think so.

The backdrop for all of this was established by Embiid over the summer, when his comments for an ESPN feature story suggested the days of pushing himself through injuries were largely over. An extended run of games in January lent hope to the idea that he was back in top form and able to lead this team through the back half of the season, but even if his form remains great in his return to the floor, any trust in his health that had been reestablished with the public is probably out the window.

Without him, of course, the Sixers have struggled mightily, suffering multiple blowout losses before the break and adding an uncompetitive loss to the now 16-42 Pelicans to the books on Saturday. Outside of the relatively competitive loss to the Hawks, the main feature of their recent performances has been a collective concession to the opponent in the second halves of games. Long gone are the days of fourth-quarter rallies and heart-stopping finishes, and here come the ceasing Sixers.

The veterans on the team have not exactly denied this fact, either, with Kelly Oubre telling reporters in New Orleans that the group is carrying an unearned confidence as they suffer defeat after defeat.

“I think we’re a little too entitled right now,” Kelly Oubre told the Inquirer on Saturday. “Teams aren’t going to roll over and let us win any of those games.”

Hanging over it all is an unanswerable question prompted by a lack of action at the trade deadline — did the Sixers kill hopeful internal vibes by sending out Jared McCain while simultaneously failing to bring in an impact player via trade? A week before the trade deadline, Embiid grumbled about the team’s habit of ducking the luxury tax in previous seasons, and the moves that followed at the deadline were future and financially focused. McCain’s output for the Sixers was minimal (and often negative) up until the final week before the deadline, but many Sixers were outwardly emotional about his loss, including Tyrese Maxey, who noted McCain was his first real mentee as a professional. McCain has immediately been a positive contributor for the defending champion Thunder, playing a healthy role with OKC banged up and missing multiple starters over the past few weeks.

However you price it all in, the Sixers have looked lost at sea with Embiid out injured and Paul George suspended until late March thanks to his violation of the league’s drug policy. VJ Edgecombe’s extended shooting slump has carried on for most of two months, and an All-Star break to refresh Tyrese Maxey has not changed his slumping three-point numbers, which have been in the tank for all of February.

In less impactful but even more depressing news, rookie big Johni Broome is now out for an indefinite period of time following a meniscus tear, which the team revealed in the same 2 pm injury report right before sending out a release on the news. Broome evidently suffered the injury in the third quarter of the Blue Coats’ G-League game on Saturday, and any timeline for his return will only become clear after they assess treatment options.

As a G-League player, Broome has put up impressive numbers this season, but a 50-point game for the Coats and averages of 19.3 points and 9.1 rebounds a night did not put him in contention for anything beyond the occasional garbage-time minutes with the big club. Broome has appeared in just 11 games for a total of 55 minutes, and has not made a shot in an NBA game since November 25th, when he played 17 minutes in the Sixers’ Thanksgiving week massacre at the hands of the Orlando Magic.

Looking forward, a meniscus injury is a potentially devastating setback for a player who is at a size and athleticism deficit relative to a lot of his NBA competition. The road ahead only gets tougher, with Broome now tasked with proving he’s an NBA player after having to rebuild strength, explosiveness, and fluidity in his lower half.

To put it lightly, the Sixers are crying out for a bit of good news or even just a surprising win. But based on the disgusting New Orleans loss, their lack of team shooting, the lack of answers from the bench, and the bummer vibes circling the team, anything other than praying Embiid comes back and saves them feels like asking for a miracle. Get well soon, big guy(s).