Joel Embiid has been a lightning rod for criticism throughout the Paris Olympics. The Philadelphia 76ers big man has not always looked comfortable when he’s been on the floor for the United States, although he broke out of his slump in a big way on Thursday against Nikola Jokic and Serbia in the Olympic semifinals.
But the much bigger source of criticism has been French fans, who pack the arena and boo Embiid with every touch. Embiid publicly flirted with joining France’s national team before announcing he’d play for the United States, and it’s clear that there are some hard feelings towards him. With a gold medal on the line when the U.S. play France in Paris on Saturday, Embiid expects that he’s going to get some stick from the fans of the home team, and as he said on Friday, he plans on giving it right back to them.
“Frankly, I don’t understand why I’ve gotten a lot of criticism from the crowd,” Embiid said, according to Brian Windhorst of ESPN. “They’re going to boo me. I’m going to go back at them and tell them to ‘suck it.’ And so it’s going to be fun.”
Embiid, a well-documented fan of the wrestling stable D-Generation X, loves to do their famous crotch chop celebration — he’s been fined by the NBA for this, and he did it in the aftermath of the Serbia game.