Joel Embiid and Paul George will not play 'many back-to-backs, if any' for the Sixers this season

Gabriela Carroll, The Philadelphia Inquirer on Oct 14, 2024

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PHILADELPHIA — Joel Embiid has battled injuries for most of his NBA tenure, including the 2023-24 season when a knee injury sidelined him for two months and stunted the 76ers’ playoffs hopes. But the Sixers appear to have a wide-ranging plan to get Embiid to the finish line.

On Sunday, Nick Nurse announced Embiid would not play in the preseason, after Embiid was sidelined for practice scrimmages. Daryl Morey talked at media day about the team’s plan to keep Embiid healthy to potentially make a deep postseason run.

“We’re very focused on April, May, June,” Morey said. “That doesn’t mean that the time right now isn’t very important as well, but we’re going to be very smart about how we manage him through the season, and there’s going to be a lot of information as we learn about how everything’s working with the entire roster.”

In an interview with ESPN, Morey and Embiid shared more about the Sixers’ plan for Embiid and new addition Paul George.

“We’re going to be smart about it,” Morey said. “Part of being smart about it is having both Paul and Joel probably not play many back-to-backs, if any.”

Embiid played four back-to-back sets last season, sat out the first game of a back-to-back once and sat the second game of a back-to-back three times. But those might be the last time we see Embiid play both halves of a back-to-back set.

“If I had to guess, I would probably never play back-to-backs the rest of my career,” Embiid told ESPN.