By now you may have heard some updates from Sixers camp. You may have heard that Ben Simmons has been playing the role of power-forward in scrimmages. You may have heard that Shake Milton has been playing some lead ball-handler. You may have heard that Matisse Thybulle is filming a documentary on life in the bubble. You may have heard that Brett Brown is planning on playing his starters (whoever they may be, although we certainly have our biases) their normal amount of minutes when the real games begin and then ramping Joel Embiid up to an ambitious 38 minutes per game come playoff time. And yeah, you may have even heard that Joel recently wore a tyvec suit for his trip to Orlando. But let’s get into what you may not have not heard.
You probably did not know that some people think and also talk about Ben Simmons shooting jump shots! But it’s true. There are intelligentsia, cognoscenti, and other fringe counterculture semi-marxist, mildly nihilistic groups who put on beret’s, meet in the wilderness, and speak in tongues about this very subject for hours on end while petting bunnies. My buddy Khalia once told me she heard they endlessly analyze his form when he does shoot and they even take pictures of every single moment he didn’t shoot to analyze what the defense did on those times too!
It’s all true look it up yourself!
And this is precisely the type of thing people like them will find very interesting. Per the Sixers official Twitter handle:
We got our run in. pic.twitter.com/ZQuK5jN0Fi
— Philadelphia 76ers (@sixers) July 15, 2020
At around the 26 second mark it appears - at a glance - that the Sixers are preparing to face some zone defense, a challenge that really plagued them during two losses they suffered to Miami and Dallas back in December. Those games were so ugly to watch that it wouldn’t be surprising to see teams pull out the ole Jim Boeheim special once the games begin.
Simmons takes the swing pass and without much hesitation knocks down the wide open three from above the break. Ho hum.
Nobody in the clip really seems to act like it’s that big of a deal. I wonder if they’ve seen it before plenty of times or were they all collectively playing it cool like when a pitcher is on pace for a no-hitter.
I couldn’t make out any Celine Dion this time, but it likely played spontaneously when he hit the shot and then the team just put that “Battle of the Gods” track over it for Twitter copy right reasons:
Ben Simmons hitting a 3-pointer with titanic music just hits different pic.twitter.com/2jXqZ5TL38
— BOUNCE (@bouncetw) October 9, 2019
So interpret all of this as you will.
Of course, we have seen instagram posts and compilation videos of guys like Markelle Fultz and Ben Simmons hitting practice threes before. Those viral vids make it easy for fans to get psyched. And then sort of amplify the awkwardness when they come back and can’t or won’t shoot.
Is anything different this time?
Can anyone reasonably expect Ben to take some 3s during during these playoffs? Would that even be good? It’s tough to say but I do think it’s notable that he took this during a team scrimmage this time and not simply while working alone with trainers, who can then go edit harder than Matisse after a long day of practice.
So what do you think? Does Ben always do this and the team’s twitter handle just let us see one? Or is it a rarity and us getting this glimpse means it’s possible this could actually be a thing? Do you want him to take a couple treys per game even if he isn’t efficient? Why or why not? I think I fall into the “yes, I’d like him to take a couple even if he isn’t good at them because at least trying could be a big step and possibly even change the trajectory of his career” crowd.
Your guess is probably as good as mine but I’m officially increasing my “he might shoot some 3s when the games resume” slice of my pie chart just a tad. One thing I know, this is going to send absolute shockwaves through that weirdos-in-the-woods community who actually discuss this particular subject.