Philadelphia 76ers

Tyrese Maxey told reporters "there was a lot said" in the Philadelphia 76ers locker room after Monday's 106-89 road loss to the Miami Heat.

ESPN's Shams Charania reported on Tuesday that Maxey called out fellow 76ers star Joel Embiid for being late to team activities after the Sixers' record dropped to 2-11 with the loss.

"I wanted to speak up," Maxey said, per The Athletic's Tony Jones. "I felt the need to do that because I wanted to share that we are better than what we have shown on the floor. There was a lot said, but it is what it is. We said what we had to say and we have to figure out a way to move on to the rest of the season. Everyone understands what's at stake. Everyone is feeling the hurt."

Maxey continued: "When they hit us, we were supposed to hit back. It was supposed to be a fight out there, but it wasn't. We kind of laid down in Miami, and that's something that we can't do anymore."

Maxey has missed six games for the Sixers with a strained right hamstring and is listed as questionable ahead of Wednesday night's road game against the Memphis Grizzlies.

Embiid was meanwhile not listed on Wednesday's injury report after missing 10 of the first 11 games of the season due to knee injury management and a suspension.

He was listed as "doubtful" due to illness ahead of Monday's game but ended up logging more than 31 minutes on the court in the loss to the Heat, shooting 5-of-11 from the field for 11 points, eight rebounds and five assists.

According to Charania, Embiid "was not seen by most teammates and coaches throughout the day before appearing for warmups and playing in the game."

Charania further wrote about the Sixers' meeting after the loss:

Players told 76ers coach Nick Nurse they want to be coached harder, and coaches in turn said they want players to practice with purpose and attention to detail.

Embiid accepted the messages sent in the meeting, sources said, but he stated that he is sometimes confused about what the 76ers are attempting to execute on the court.

Charania added: "Maxey is highly regarded as a young leader by many in the organization and those around the team were not surprised that he spoke up Monday."

The Sixers climbed out to an early lead over the Heat but were unable to maintain the advantage as the ball control problems that have plagued the team so far this season continued.

Philadelphia entered the third quarter leading by three points and exited trailing by 16 amid turnover issues and defensive struggles. That late slump has been a pattern for the 76ers, who through 13 games rank 27th in the league with a third-quarter net rating of minus-19.4.

Maxey will hope the team meeting will spark an improvement for the second-half Sixers, although injuries will continue to limit the team going forward. Maxey will be on a minutes restriction if he is available against the Grizzlies, per Jones, and Kyle Lowry is set to miss the game with a right hip strain.

The Philadelphia 76ers are a mess. The team, embroiled in a 2-11 start, reportedly held a team meeting on Monday night that included Tyrese Maxey calling out Joel Embiid for chronic tardiness to team activities, according to ESPN's Shams Charania.

Despite this latest batch of drama surrounding the Sixers, however, Sam Amick, David Aldridge and Jared Weiss of The Athletic reported on Tuesday that there is "no internal discussion at this point regarding the job status of coach Nick Nurse or president of basketball operations Daryl Morey."

The 2024-25 season was supposed to be an exciting one for the Sixers.

Paul George was signed in the offseason, giving the team the ideal two-way star to pair with Embiid and Maxey. It was arguably the most talented and complementary group of stars the team has had in the Embiid era, and one that was bolstered by a suite of solid suite of veteran role players, including Caleb Martin, Kyle Lowry, Andre Drummond, Kelly Oubre Jr. and Eric Gordon, among others.

But the trio of Embiid, George and Maxey has yet to play a single game together due to injuries and Embiid's three-game suspension. Both Embiid and George have looked rusty upon their returns, and the role players haven't been able to patch the leaks. And now, the team's internal business is being leaked to the media.

It hasn't all been negative. Jared McCain is the early frontrunner for the Rookie of the Year award and has looked like a future star, averaging 15.2 points and 2.5 assists per game. He's posted five straight games with 20 or more points, helping to somewhat make up for Maxey's absence, and looks like a crucial contributor for the team going forward.

Guerschon Yabusele has also been a revelation, providing the team with an option at both the 4 and 5, in large part due to his impressive perimeter shooting (36.7 percent from three).

But the Sixers will live and die with the performances of Embiid, George and Maxey, and they can't afford to continue losing at such a consistent clip. The Play-In Tournament has perhaps rendered such a slow start as less impactful than in years past, but the Sixers are treading dangerous grounds at the moment.

And while it reportedly hasn't led to a hot seat for Nurse or Morey to this point, it's fair to question if either would survive a season that didn't include a playoff berth.

After falling to 2-11 with a 106-89 loss to the Miami Heat on Monday night, the Philadelphia 76ers held a team meeting in which rising star guard Tyrese Maxey reportedly called out star center Joel Embiid.

According to ESPN's Shams Charania, Maxey criticized Embiid for being late "for everything" and "challenged" the former NBA MVP to be on time for team activities going forward.

Charania added that Maxey described how Embiid's lateness "impacts the locker room, from other players to the coaching staff."

However, it doesn't sound like this situation is an indication of a fractured relationship between Philadelphia's top two stars. Charania noted that people around the team said Embiid and Maxey "have a close friendship and have a history of holding each other accountable."

"Tyrese loves Big Fella', but this is the elephant in the room," a person involved in the meeting told Charania.

Sources told Charania that Embiid "accepted the messages sent in the meeting" but also "stated he is confused about what the 76ers are attempting to execute sometimes on the court." He posted just 11 points and eight rebounds in Monday's loss, which was just his third appearance of the season after he missed the start of the year due to left knee injury management and a three-game suspension for an altercation with a local columnist.

Maxey has been sidelined since Nov. 7 due to a hamstring injury, but Charania noted that the 24-year-old "is highly regarded as a young leader by many in the organization and those around the team were not surprised that he spoke up Monday."

He's reportedly expected to return to the court this week.

When Maxey is healthy, the Sixers will finally get the chance to see how he and Embiid fit alongside star forward Paul George, who is in his first year in Philadelphia after signing with the team this past offseason.

The Sixers will try to get back on track when they meet the Memphis Grizzlies (8-6) on Wednesday.

Amid a dreadful 2-10 start to the season, Tyrese Maxey is doing his best to keep optimism alive for the Philadelphia 76ers.

In a post on X, Maxey wrote implored Sixers fans "don't give up on us yet" because he still believes in the team.

It's hard to find any reason to be hopeful about the 76ers right now. Their new big three of Maxey, Joel Embiid and Paul George have yet to play in a game together.

It's been a struggle just to get two of them in the same game. George and Maxey played two games together before Maxey suffered a strained hamstring in 110-98 loss to the Los Angeles Clippers on Nov. 6.

That left George to be the focal point for the Sixers for two games until Embiid made his season debut on Nov. 12 against the New York Knicks. Both players sat out the next game against the Cleveland Cavaliers since it was the second night of a back-to-back.

Even when Embiid has played, he has looked like a shell of himself. The former MVP is averaging 16.5 points on 26.9 percent shooting with more turnovers (4.0) than assists (3.5) per game in two starts.

All of these issues have led to the Sixers losing 10 of their first 12 games and posting the fourth-worst net rating in the NBA (minus-8.5).

As bleak as things appear right now, Maxey's optimism isn't totally unfounded. He sounded upbeat when discussing his recovery prior to Friday's game against the Orlando Magic.

"I feel great," he said. "I feel really good, man. Got a chance to move around on the court a little bit the last couple of days. I'm moving faster, and I feel a lot more confident. I should be out there sooner than later."

There will come a point when the Sixers get their top three players on the court together at the same time, so we can see what they look like when all of the pieces they planned to have this summer are in place.

Embiid, one would assume, will start to play better as he gets his body up to speed after a long layoff.

It also helps that after the Cavaliers and Boston Celtics, the Eastern Conference has been incredibly mediocre to start this season. The Magic (8-6) are the only other team in the East besides the Cavs and Celtics with a winning record.

Philadelphia is only 3.5 games behind the Miami Heat for the No. 6 seed entering Sunday. There is plenty of time for the Sixers to get on track and make a playoff push when they get Maxey, George and Embiid playing together.

Philadelphia 76ers big man Joel Embiid's first appearance of the 2024-25 season was concerning because he didn't look like himself.

On the latest episode of the Hoop Collective Podcast (starts at 26:25 mark), ESPN's Brian Windhorst noted that Embiid "looked alarmingly slow" in his return from a knee injury.

Embiid finished the game with 13 points on 2-of-11 shooting, five assists and three rebounds in 26 minutes against the New York Knicks on Tuesday.

While this is absolutely a cause for concern, there are reasons to explain it away. Embiid was playing his first NBA game in nearly seven months, so his conditioning wasn't going to be in peak form.

The fact that Embiid was able to make it through the game without significant incident is a positive sign. He sat out Wednesday's game against the Cleveland Cavaliers on the second night of a back-to-back.

Philadelphia doesn't have another back-to-back until Dec. 3-4, so the hope will be that he can get regular playing time over the next few weeks to get back into peak game shape.

Injuries have been a storyline for much of Embiid's career, and that was once again the case at the start of the 2024-25 season when he was sidelined with knee concerns.

The NBA investigated the situation and determined the team didn't violate the player participation policy because there was a genuine concern about the knee but still fined the 76ers $100,000 because of public comments made about the situation.

ESPN's Shams Charania reported on Oct. 31 the "new normal" for Embiid would "include periodic time off at different points during the season. It's going to include routine check-ups on his knee over the course of the season."

Embiid has never played more than 68 games in a season and appeared in just 39 games in 2023-24.

Managing his health with the playoffs in mind is surely a priority for the 76ers at this point, but they are off to a 2-9 start and need to start stringing together wins if they want to have a chance to make the postseason.

Look for the combination of Andre Drummond, Guerschon Yabusele and even Adem Bona to see more time if head coach Nick Nurse wants to ease Embiid back into things.

The Philadelphia 76ers have the second-worst record in the Eastern Conference at 2-9, but they provided their fans with a bit of positivity on Thursday.

The Sixers unveiled their Nike City Edition uniforms for the 2024-25 season in a series of photos on social media:

The Sixers also released a retro-themed video explaining that the City Edition uniforms are meant to pay homage to the famed Spectrum, where they played until the end of the 1995-96 season.

Philadelphia suffered a 114-106 loss at home on Wednesday night against the Cleveland Cavaliers, who are the NBA's last remaining undefeated team at 13-0. The Sixers were without stars Joel Embiid and Paul George, both of whom were held out of the game due to knee injury management. Star point guard Tyrese Maxey's absence also continued due to his hamstring strain.

Without its top stars available, Philadelphia got a stellar performance out of rookie guard Jared McCain, who had career-highs of 34 points and 10 assists in the loss. The 2024 No. 16 pick has emerged as a key contributor in the wake of the Sixers' array of injuries, so the team should be pleased with his development.

Still, Philadelphia is in an early-season hole that will make it difficult to achieve its goal of competing for an NBA title. The combination of Embiid, George and Maxey and expected to propel the Sixers into the conversation of top contenders in the league, but the three of them have yet to be on the floor at the same time.

Philadelphia will try to give fans some more positivity when it faces the Orlando Magic on Friday.

The Philadelphia 76ers, already beset by injuries early in the 2024-25 season, have opened the campaign with a 2-8 mark.

It's a steep and early hole the team has dug for itself, but Paul George said on his podcast Wednesday that the Sixers aren't panicking just yet.

"We feel good where we're at," he said on Podcast P. "We haven't played well, I personally haven't shot the ball well. I feel like I'm starting to get my feeling, my timing back. I'm starting to feel like myself again. I missed the whole preseason, so my legs have been heavy. I've been a little more gassed than usual. Just tired, so I'm starting to get all my wind back. Get my legs back under me. I'm still learning teammates, I'm learning spacing, I'm learning [how Nick Nurse coaches]. ... Once we start winning and figure out who we are, our identity, we'll turn the tide and go the other way."

The Sixers completely reworked their roster around Joel Embiid and Tyrese Maxey this offseason, adding George, Caleb Martin, Andre Drummond, Guerschon Yabusele, Eric Gordon and Reggie Jackson in free agency, drafting Jared McCain and re-signing Kelly Oubre Jr. and Kyle Lowry.

It was always likely that the new roster would need time to jell. But that was put on hold after George and Embiid were hurt to start the regular season and Maxey suffered an injury early on in the campaign.

The only positive for the Sixers thus far has been that the injuries to the star trio have allowed players like Yabusele and McCain to get increased run.

Yabusele has been a surprise contributor given his prowess from beyond the arc (40.5 percent), while McCain has looked like the steal of the 2024 NBA draft (11.5 PPG, 1.5 APG, 35.9 percent from three, two straight performances with 23 or more points) and has likely earned himself a significant role the rest of the season.

But the Sixers will go as far as Embiid, George and Maxey can take them. The trio has yet to play together in a single game. Embiid only made his season debut during Tuesday's loss to the New York Knicks, while George has appeared in just five games and has been on a soft minutes restriction, averaging 17.2 points, 5.8 rebounds, 5.2 assists and two steals per game across 29.2 minutes, shooting 42.5 percent from the field and just 30.6 percent from three.

And Embiid was even rustier upon his return—he scored 13 points and had five assists on Tuesday night but shot 2-of-11 from the field and looked labored. It was a concerning first showing, with the hope that he simply wasn't in game shape yet and there weren't deeper, more underlying concerns with his recovery from knee issues.

George was effusive in his praise of Embiid on Wednesday.

"When we practice, he is so dominant," he said. "It makes the game so easy. He's so good, isolation-wise, you have to help. No way you leave anyone to guard him by themselves. He plays like a guard in a big's body. He's talented, bro, I've never seen someone at his size just have that much talent. He can do it all."

He's going to have to as the Sixers seek to turn around what has been a brutal start. It won't get better for the Sixers on Wednesday evening, however, with both Embiid and George already ruled out for the second half of a back-to-back against the Cleveland Cavaliers.

Paul George had a message for Los Angeles Clippers fans after being booed when he returned to Los Angeles last week.

On his podcast, Podcast P, the Philadelphia 76ers star called out fans for not filling up the Intuit Dome in Los Angeles and said they proved him right by saying the Clippers felt like the city's "B team."

"What did I say that was wrong? I did not call Clippers 'the B team.'" he said. "I said it felt like the B team… Everywhere you go, people in L.A. say you should be a Laker... But they proved me right. They aren't packing out Intuit Dome. That's ya'll home… Go f--king support them."

After spending five seasons with Los Angeles, George signed a four-year, $212 million deal with the 76ers in July.

In his first game against the Clippers since leaving this offseason, George put up 18 points and seven rebounds as Philadelphia lost 110-98. In five games with his new team, the veteran is averaging 17.2 points, 5.8 boards and 5.2 assists per game.

His time in Philadelphia hasn't gone great so far as the team is off to a 2-8 start following Tuesday's loss to the New York Knicks in the NBA Cup. The Clippers have fared a little bit better early on, sitting at 6-5 on the year despite being without star Kawhi Leonard, who sidelined indefinitely with a knee injury.

The Clippers are trying to shake the notion that they are Los Angeles' B-team, and they made progress this year by getting their own stadium. The Intuit Dome opened earlier this year in Inglewood, California, meaning the Clippers no longer have to play in the same arena as the Lakers.

As George mentioned, the Intuit Dome hasn't exactly been a packed house. The Clippers are averaging 16,827 fans in attendance per game compared to the 18,945 fans per game they had last season in Crypto.com Arena.

Their attendance will likely improve once Leonard returns and games get a bit more meaningful later on this year, but for now, George's point stands.

Joel Embiid and Paul George will miss their team's home game against the Cleveland Cavaliers on Wednesday because of ongoing left knee injury management, per ESPN's Shams Charania.

Embiid made his season debut Tuesday in a 111-99 NBA Cup loss to the New York Knicks, scoring 13 points in 26 minutes. George also suited up, leading the team with 29 points and 10 rebounds.

Embiid missed over two months last year with an injured meniscus in his left knee. He returned in early April and finished the season out, which ended with a six-game first-round loss to the New York Knicks.

Embiid suited up for Team USA in the Summer Olympics, but he sat out the Sixers' first nine games for both left knee management and a three-game suspension after he shoved a member of the media following the 76ers' 124-107 loss to the Memphis Grizzlies on Nov. 2.

He's back in the mix now but struggled out of the gate to start, shooting just 2-of-11 while grabbing only three rebounds. However, Embiid noted that he still needs to regain confidence in his left knee as he continues his ramp-up to full strength.

"It's all about confidence and trusting myself," he said, per ESPN's Tim Bontemps. "Pushing off ... I talked about it a couple weeks ago when I talked to you guys, that's the mental hurdle that I got to get to. But I think I can still be pretty good even without that, which I'm going to get to at some point.

"I don't know when. Might be next game, might be in two games ... [but] usually get it back pretty fast, so I'm fine."

Embiid previously told reporters he will never play back-to-back games for the rest of his career. However, he expressed interest in playing against the Cavs on Wednesday.

That won't happen. His next opportunity to play in a back-to-back would be on Dec. 3 and 4 against the Charlotte Hornets and Orlando Magic, though it's hard to envision him taking part in both games given the 76ers' regimented plan.

As for George, he suffered a bone bruise after hyperextending his left knee during a preseason game. He missed the 76ers' first five contests but has been back since Nov. 4, averaging 17.2 points on 42.5 percent shooting, 5.8 rebounds and 5.2 assists over 29.2 minutes per game.

George should be good to go moving forward as the 76ers seem to want to take the cautious route here, and he looked like his old self Tuesday in his best game of the year.

But the 2-8 Sixers as a whole have struggled mightily so far, and Wednesday's game against the 12-0 Cavaliers presents an uphill battle, especially with All-Star guard Tyrese Maxey already out multiple weeks with a hamstring injury.

Tipoff on Wednesday is set for 7:30 p.m. ET in Philadelphia's Wells Fargo Center.

Joel Embiid's first game of the season ended with an 111-99 loss to the New York Knicks in the NBA Cup.

The Philadelphia 76ers played a mostly competitive game in their first group play game, but the Knicks built a double-digit lead in the fourth quarter and never looked back.

Embiid, who had not yet played this season due to recovery from a knee injury and a three-game suspension, struggled in the loss. He shot a measly 2-of-11 from the field on his way to 13 points along with three rebounds and five assists, far from the play fans are accustomed to seeing from the former MVP.

The 76ers' newest star, Paul George, put together a solid game with 29 points and 10 boards while rookie Jared McCain continued to show his potential with 23 points.

On the Knicks' side, it was win-by-committee as six different players were in double figures. OG Anunoby led the way with 24 points and Karl-Anthony Towns added 21.

After the loss, fans called out Embiid for his rough outing in his season debut.

With the loss, the 76ers dropped to 2-8 on the year to continue what has been a disappointing start to the season.

Philadelphia fans hoped things would turn around with Embiid back, but Tuesday's loss wasn't a good indication that he'll make much of a difference. Of course, it takes time to get ramped up after missing time, so Embiid could return to MVP form in a matter of games.