What injury is Joel Embiid suffering and how long will he be out?

Things are going badly in Philadelphia, where in recent days, each new development is worse than the previous one. The franchise, which had skipped along happily for almost the entire first half of the season, finds itself ina strange and dangerous whirlwind with Joel Embiid’s situation. They are caught not knowing what to do, between waiting or reacting in the market (which closes on Thursday) after the departure of James Harden, who took his talent but certainly left peace of mind.

The latest storm all started after Embiid scored 70 points against the Spurs - in the process adding a row of exclamation marks after his candidacy for a repeat as MVP (he is averaging +35 points, 11 rebounds and 5 assists). A few days later, Embiid sat out the game in Denver and the 76ers were slapped with a $75,000 fine for failing to include him on the team’s injury report. Beforehand, there had been a flood of soundbites about how much he wanted to face Nikola Jokic in Colorado... He also missed the following game in Portland, in which the team crashed to a 130-104 defeat only to reappear against the Warriors and hobble off injured.

Embiid suffering a torn meniscus

He went from talking about whether or not he wanted to skip certain games to debating why he had played the one in San Francisco at all. A mess that questions the entire structure of the franchise (decision-making) and that will continue to be a tinderbox because the tests carried out on the Cameroonian center’s left knee have revealed that he has damaged the lateral meniscus.

For now, the only thing that is known in terms of treatment and recovery timelines is that Embiid will not play in the coming days (against the Nets on Saturday and Mavs on Monday). In the meantime, both he and the Sixers will decide what to do next and how to do it. This meniscus injury could be the final blow to Embiid’s chances of repeating as MVP.

MVP options under threat

It’s an untimely setback for a player who was in the process of achieving something incredible, that only Wilt Chamberlain has achieved so far: finishing a season with more points than minutes on-court. But today’s game against the Jazz in Salt Lake City was the 13th game that Embiid has missed this season (of the 47 that they have played). That could very soon becomes highly significant because under the new (and much questioned) rules that have been applied this season, any player who misses more than 17 games (a minimum of 65 is required) will no longer be eligible for the MVP or the All-Star Team. It is also likely that Embiid will miss the All Star game in Indianapolis, for which he had been chosen as the starting center in the East.

But the real issue, the crucial one, is in the deadlines and guarantees of Embiid’s recovery now that the playoffs, little by little, begin to appear on the horizon. On the way to turning 30 next month and without having yet played in a Conference final, this was a key season for a player who always carries the shadow of injuries, of the difficulty in playing at 100% of his (enormous ) possibilities - especially when spring arrives. We’ll see how this new and dangerous setback affects all of that... and what the Sixers do between now and Thursday, the day the winter market closes.