One of the more under-the-radar elements of the James Harden-Ben Simmons trade is that the Philadelphia 76ers had to give up backup big man Andre Drummond. While backup centers don’t normally get a ton of love, Philly has struggled for years to figure out what to do when Joel Embiid is on the bench, and Drummond has easily been the best backup 5 that they’ve had.
As such, the minutes behind Embiid have to go somewhere, and beloved Sixers reserve Paul Reed got a chance to fill in for the MVP candidate on Friday night against the Oklahoma City Thunder. Reed is known for being a tenacious defender, which he put on display in the second quarter when he took an inbound pass away from Darius Bazley. Reed had a clear path to the rim after that, and appeared to think it was time to do something flashy.
The catch: Reed misjudged his path to the rim, so instead of doing what I think was supposed to be a LeBron-esque dunk where he rocks his arms to the side and then back around and dunks with both hands and his back facing the rim, this happened.
Oh man … this didn’t go like Paul Reed imagined
pic.twitter.com/d6SVXSevlS
— NBC Sports Philadelphia (@NBCSPhilly) February 12, 2022
“You just gotta come up with the two points here” is some excellent analysis. Anyway, the Sixers led at halftime, 46-41, while Reed had two points, three rebounds, two blocks, and two steals in seven minutes of work in the first half.