17 Years Later And We're Still Talkin' About Practice
So as you’re all well aware of at this point, today is the 17th anniversary of Allen Iverson’s infamous “Practice” rant. Now a lot has changed over the course of the past 17 years, but one thing has remained the same–we’re still talking about practice. This time with another franchise player.
You know how when you were in college and everybody in the dorms would get sick pretty much every other day because you’re all disgusting human beings who were living extremely close together? Like there was simply no way that your immune system could possibly fight against all the germs that were running through the dorms? Well Joel Embiid is pretty much a college kid who is sick every other day.
In game 2 of this series, Joel Embiid had the shits. That’s a medical term for an upset stomach. Then 9 hours before tip-off in game 4, Joel Embiid said that he had some sort of flu-like virus and he couldn’t sleep at all. Now today, Joel Embiid is missing the morning shoot around with an upper respiratory infection, which is probably still lingering from game 4 so it’s not like a whole new illness. But we’re in game 5 of this series right now and Joel Embiid has had some sort of illness for 3 of them. Not ideal!
It sucks that we have to keep having this conversation before every game. It would certainly be nice to have a franchise player who can stay healthy for longer than a week at a time. It sucks waking up every morning and turning on sports talk radio only to hear a bunch of idiots calling in to complain about Joel Embiid stuffing his face with Shake Shack before games. But you know what would make all of this go away?
Joel Embiid is in Canada right now so he can get all the free health care he needs. So let’s say they pump him full of fluids before the game tonight. And then Joel Embiid goes off for 40 points as the Sixers absolutely crush the Raptors on the road to take a 3-2 series lead back to Philly. And then in his post-game press conference, Embiid starts off by saying “I’m supposed to be the franchise player and we’re talkin’ about my diet? Not a game. Not a game. Not a game. We talkin’ about my diet. Not the game that I go out there and die for. We talkin’ about my diet. How is my diet going to make my teammates better? We’re talkin’ about my diet, man”. If Embiid does a parody of the “practice” rant tonight after a huge Sixers win, he immediately becomes the 2nd biggest legend to ever throw on that jersey with a legitimate chance at becoming #1.