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Well, it turns out this was a highly-anticipated injury report for both teams.
Ahead of their showdown with the Boston Celtics on NBC Sunday, the Sixers have officially ruled out Joel Embiid for their next three games with a right oblique strain.
This happened to Embiid earlier in the week against the Miami Heat, when he got Kel’el Ware to bite on a pump fake, causing him to jump and hit Embiid in the ribs with his knee inadvertently. He didn’t really miss much of that game due to it, but he was favoring his midsection the entire rest of the contest.
After a quick 4-of-7 start the game, Embiid was clearly hampered by this. He shot 4-of-13 the rest of the night with two ugly turnovers. Here’s a clip of the play where it happened.
Embiid was not a participant at the Sixers’ most recent practice. A team spokesperson told reporters that he had been feeling an increase of soreness in the area since that Heat game and still had some consulting with the team’s medical staff to do.
Upon the release of the official report, the team announced that Embiid underwent an MRI that revealed the strain, ruling him out for the two games following Boston as well.
This once again puts the Sixers in a precarious spot as they desperately try to cling on to the sixth seed in the East. They went 1-4 in their most recent five-game stretch without Embiid, three of those losses being decisive blowouts at that. It’s also a bummer because we will again be robbed of the rematch between Embiid and Victor Wembanyama when the Spurs come to Philly early next week.
So the Sixers will be shorthanded, but at least they won’t be the first team to take on the Boston Celtics at full strength this season. Despite the rumblings and weird advertisements tied in with NBC, Jayson Tatum will not be making his season debut Sunday night.
Tatum of course hasn’t played since last May, when he tore his Achilles tendon in his right leg during Game 4 of the second round of the playoffs against the New York Knicks. It’s truly remarkable that he’s so close to returning this was even considered a possibility by some. At least the Sixers caught this break, and they won’t see Tatum unless these teams see each other in the playoffs.