The Ben Simmons saga in Philadelphia, which seems to have a new twist every single day, has now gotten to a point where his current teammates are eager to get involved. There’s just one problem: Simmons has no interest in any sort of face-to-face meeting with a group that wants to come to him.
According to Shams Charania of The Athletic, a collection of Sixers players headed up by Joel Embiid and Tobias Harris made clear to Simmons that they wanted to fly out to Los Angeles and talk through his ongoing trade saga. Their efforts were met with resistance from Simmons, who apparently told them it wasn’t something he’d be interested in.
The core leaders on the 76ers — such as Joel Embiid, Tobias Harris and Matisse Thybulle — and most of the team were set to take a jet to see Simmons before being turned away, sources said. Multiple sources said Simmons didn’t want his teammates, some of whom he considers friends, to make the Philadelphia-to-Los Angeles commute out of courtesy because he won’t change his mind on wanting a trade.
Simmons and his camp have made clear to the Sixers that he has no intention of ever suiting up for the franchise again, to the point that he plans on not reporting to training camp when it begins early next week. Philly, through head coach Doc Rivers, has expressed that it is going to do whatever it can to bring him back, but it appears that any and all efforts would be for naught. Now, the question is whether or not any team will be able to meet the team’s sky high reported asking price, or if the Sixers would be willing to negotiate down to bring this saga to an end.