Philadelphia 76ers star Joel Embiid has accomplished a lot in his career. Despite the injuries holding him back at the most inopportune times, the superstar big man has led the league in scoring twice, won the MVP award in 2023, and finished second in MVP in 2021 and 2022.
Embiid was on his way to winning MVP again in 2024 as he was dominating at such a high level. He was closing games out in the third quarter and sitting out the fourth. He was playing at an other-worldly level before suffering the knee injury in January of that year.
When looking at Embiid’s career, Bleacher Report ranked him No. 66 on their top 100 players of all time list:
The best stretch of Embiid’s career came from 2020-21 to 2022-23, when he finished second, second and first in MVP voting and was the clear top challenger to Nikola Jokić’s incredible run during that same span.
Embiid had loads of physical advantages when healthy, including balletic footwork, shooting touch and pure strength. But he also developed serious craft and led the league in made free throws three times and is the current all-time leader in career free-throw makes per game at 8.3.
With games played totals of 39 in 2023-24 and just 19 this past season, Embiid is struggling to stay on the floor more than ever. He’s a Hall of Famer if he never plays another game.
When looking back at Embiid’s career whenever he does decide to hang it up, one will likely believe it was more of a “what if?” type of situation. If only the big fella had ever stayed healthy for one playoff run, he probably would have led the Sixers to their first venture past Round 2 since the 2001 run to the finals led by Allen Iverson.
Instead, the Sixers are waiting to see if Embiid will be healthy and ready to go for the 2025-26 season after undergoing a second knee surgery in a span of 14 months back in April.