Joel Embiid is sidelined for the second straight game due to right knee soreness, causing concern for his potential longevity this season.
After a promising start to the season for Joel Embiid, the Philadelphia 76ers' star center is now set to miss his sixth game of the season through 12 games. To make matters worse, he was sidelined against the Boston Celtics with right knee soreness, which is the opposite knee that he had surgery on last season.
Embiid missed his first four games of the season due to load management, but this new injury is quite concerning. After evaluation by the team doctors on Tuesday, they didn't find any structural damage to the knee which is a good sign, but it's still discouraging that it's now making him miss multiple games.
Additionally, Embiid has been on a minutes restriction all season, with his season-high in minutes being 26. To already be missing games due to soreness shows that his conditioning isn't where it needs to be. Granted, this is the main reason for the minutes restriction, but that should prevent this from happening, especially this early in the season.
It's particularly frustrating when he's been finally able to get back to the level of play that he's used to being at, with his last game being his best of the season. Against the Toronto Raptors, Embiid scored 29 points in 26 minutes and played a big part in the team's victory.
He also looked the best that he has all season, which could unfortunately be the reason that he's now out. In that game, he was running up and down the court with pace and repeatedly meeting players at the rim on defense. These weren't things that he was doing in his first few games so it was encouraging at the time, but now looking back, it would make sense that the extra effort could be what's causing soreness in his knee.
If that's the case, then his minutes restriction will likely remain on for the entire season, as they just try to get him healthy for the playoffs. With the rest of the team performing much better than anticipated, the Sixers will have a legitimate shot in the playoffs if the team is healthy.
They should also be getting Paul George back shortly, which will bolster the roster even more. If the team can do enough to get to the playoffs without Embiid leading the way, he may have a shot at finally leading the team to a postseason run. Unfortunately, however, with this soreness coming this early in the season, it's looking less likely that he'll remain fully healthy by that point.