Joel Embiid Quit In An Elimination Game While Bryce Harper Treated A Random Game In May Like One
Andy Cross/MediaNews Group/The Denver Post via Getty Images. Getty Images.I'm going to start this blog off by saying something right now which might come off as a joke, but I promise you that it's meant in total sincerity.
Joel Embiid is closer to being the worst basketball player in the world than he is to being Bryce Harper.
Obviously the difference in skill level between guys like Joel Embiid and someone like Rear Admiral is so large that it's almost impossible to compute.
But the difference in compete level between Joel Embiid and a guy like Bryce Harper is drastically larger.
And the difference is that you can train skill pretty easily. It's much more difficult to train compete. For the most part, you're born with it. And if you're not born with it, you develop it through years and years of hyper-focusing on nothing but winning. Some guys want it, and some guys just say that they want it. Some guys just look for excuses for why they can't get it.
There's a lot of finger pointing that goes on after a tough loss in sports. A great leader will always point the first one at himself, and then to the rest of the guys. Sure seems like Embiid should have led off with "we can't win when I play 10 points worse in the postseason than I do in meaningless regular season games".
That would be a great place to start. That would show the world that Joel Embiid has a little bit of fire and willing to do whatever it takes to lead this team to the next level instead of folding like a beach chair when the moment gets the biggest. The moment Joel Embiid feels like a game isn't going his way, his body language tells you everything you need to know for the rest of the night. He's going silent. He's going to sulk his way up and down the court until he gets taken out. He gives up, taps out, and starts thinking of excuses for why he couldn't get it done that night.
Bryce Harper will literally fuck an entire organization's shit up for clapping their glove in his direction.
And sure, the Phillies still lost that game yesterday. But that's not the point. There will always be losing that comes with the winning. That's just part of the game. But it's the intensity and the drive that makes guys like Bryce Harper a superstar and guys like Joel Embiid just really talented regular season players. And again, you can't teach that. At least not by the time Embiid is 30 years old. The guy had to get yelled at by PJ Tucker in the 4th quarter of a playoff game to wake up and start competing.
That's no superstar. Not even close.