Imagine clamoring for someone who's acting like a lil' diva and cut off communication with his team. If ANYONE was doing that here we all know how most would respond. Y'all hate CJ that much? GTFO...
That was a Bay Area sports radio show where the host was just riffing about the fact that he's heard that Ben Simmons is a LA socialite and the host... who then cited himself in the B/R article... speculated that because he'd heard that Simmons is a socialite he wouldn't want to go to a California team and not teams that are a mess like the Blazers and Raptors. Listen to the clip from his radio show, it's bullshit. Complete speculation. Just a guy trying to inject himself into a hot narrative and you're taking his word like it's Shams or Woj.
Oh, I know that. I’ve said the same thing about that guy in other posts. OTOH, there was nothing but crickets out of Simmons when those reports arose. If a guy wants out of Philly that badly, you’d think that he would be quick to tamp something like that down if it wasn’t true. I mean, we all know the history of guys not wanting to sign or get traded here.
I could see that if he was a frequent social media guy. Though my guess is that Ben doesn't care much for media - so he's not going to go out of his way to respond. Admittedly, I'm not a social media guy either (S2 is as close as I come to it).... so I don't know if Ben frequents FB, Twitter, etc.
Yeah, there's been nothing but crickets from Simmons all off season and after the way Doc and Embiid treated him, I don't blame him. I think he's just waiting to be traded and I remember when he was drafted saying that he just wanted to be picked first and he didn't care which team it was. So I think he just wants a new start somewhere and then we'll see him come out and talk about how he's ready to try and turn the page. There has been no indication from him or his people that there was any validity to that rumor (it wasn't even a report) and there's never even been a whisper about the guy having a list of teams. The guy grew up in Australia, went to high school in central Florida, college in Baton Rouge and has never made a peep about not liking playing in Philly and wanting to go to California.
Calm the fuck down. Everyone who knows me in this forum knows my sarcasm meter is broken. I don't know what to do with jokes that aren't funny. I didn't even know it was a joke. Jokes are supposed to be funny. What you said was stupid to me and didn't make sense. No I didn't recognize your unfunny "joke"...
I think many of us love CJ, but know that to become a well rounded roster we need an impact PF. Not some used up free agent with little ability. The only way to acquire that PF is through trade. Green & Harris would help this team in a big way. I totally agree on Nightlife Boy. He's got Head Upcha.
I'm on board with wanting CJ gone. But to trade him for Simmons is STUPID IMHO. I'd honestly rather have Jerami Grant that Tobias Harris if Siakam is off the table.
I will say that Simmons fits pretty well in Minnesota. They have score first guards (though, presumably they'd have to give up Anthony Edwards in the trade) and their star big man is comfortable playing on the perimeter and shooting threes. Minnesota badly needs its own "Draymond Green." The thing is, people keep saying that Simmons is a young, more athletic Green but that's not necessarily the case. People make the comparison between two great defensive forwards who can handle and pass and aren't shooting threats, but there's a huge difference between their style of defense. Simmons, like Kawhi Leonard, is a superior individual defender to Draymond Green. Green is very good as a multi-positional defender, but he doesn't have the sheer athleticism to lock down the way Leonard or Simmons can. Where Green shines is essentially as a defensive coordinator on the court--his genius lies in sniffing out plays ahead of time, knowing where his teammates should be two steps ahead and directing them there when necessary. Simmons (and really no other current player) has shown that particular genius and that's really what a team like Minnesota needs more than a great individual defender. But still, they could use a great individual defender who can plug any single hole at need, they have other scorers and Simmons doesn't really get in the way of Russell or Towns, the way he struggled to fit optimally alongside Embiid.
I don't think MN will give up Edwards. I think he will eventually be the best player to come out of that draft and he will be a good two-way player. I don't know who they would give up. Probably Russel before Edwards.
Ah found the insider/rumor stuff that had the Simmons stuff. Apparently he's a dude on the Hawks' forum who is connected and called stuff before: https://www.hawksquawk.net/topic/432784-2020-21-the-current-ask-supes/page/92/#comments
