Merriam Webster’s dictionary describes “brain death” as the “final cessation of activity in the central nervous system, especially as indicated by a flat electroencephalogram for a predetermined length of time.” NBA awards voters, made up of a panel of 100 sportswriters and broadcasters, may not exhibit these symptoms exactly. I personally do not have access to their electroencephalogram data, whatever that is. However, the results of their Most Valuable Player and Defensive Player of the Year voting – in which Joel Embiid and Ben Simmons were unceremoniously snubbed – should serve as an equally compelling substitute:

I mean, dear God. Those voting numbers alone should tell you all you need to know about the mental capacity of the NBA media. It’s an absolute travesty the way these votes shook out. Sure, I know I’m a massive homer. That’s part of the charm. However, what the national media and other fanbases don’t get about Philly fans is how our homerism functions.

We do not elevate players we know are terrible. We’re not Jazz or Heat fans. Hell, some of us are never happy with our top players, regardless of their recent form.

That’s one of the main reasons why Philly fans are so enraged by these results. We know how deserving Joel Embiid and Ben Simmons were, and the national media either refused or lacked the cognitive function to see what was right in front of them: pure dominance.

Joel Embiid’s MVP snub: expected but still infuriating

You cannot sit there and tell me Joel Embiid was not the most dominant player in the NBA. Sure, Steph Curry scored a lot on a bad team, and Nikola Jokic was neck and neck with Joel before he went down.

Regardless, it should have been clear Joel was the best player in the NBA. Just look at the playoffs. Jokic is getting bitched around by Deandre Ayton. He’s not strong enough to play physically inside, and the Nuggets will get swept because of it. Meanwhile, Joel is running through any big man in his path, just like he did all season.

Sure, Joel Embiid did miss a decent portion of the regular season with a knee injury. We all knew the media would look down upon that, and sure enough, they did. However, according to StatMuse, Joel Embiid was not even on every voter’s ballot.

THREE. That’s the magic number of reporters or broadcasters that must pay for their crimes.

Look, I get that maybe the injury took him out of first place, but to not even have Joel Embiid in fifth place on your ballot is just plain stupid. Do these people even watch basketball? Or did they see him get injured in the regular season and just submit their ballots immediately after?

I’m going to get too pissed off to keep writing, so let’s chat about how Ben “I Guard 1-5” Simmons was snubbed even harder than Joel Embiid was.

Ben Simmons’ DPOY snub was a betrayal on levels nobody has seen

It was announced last night (LIVE during The Wolves of Broad Street’s weekly stream) that Rudy Gobert was voted the NBA’s Defensive Player of the Year. 

Obviously, this was based entirely on his reputation as a rim protector. If people in the national media actually watched Sixers games, they’d see that Ben Simmons is by far the better defender. 

“But Ryan, if you watched any Jazz games, you’d see what Rudy can do!” 

First of all, I do. I can guarantee you watch more league-wide basketball than the average national media member. Just ask my co-host, Sam Glavin, he thinks I’m mentally ill with the amount of non-Sixers basketball I consume. 

Second of all, the case for Gobert winning the DPOY award should have gone out the window in a game AGAINST the Sixers. See below:

I want to laugh, but it’s not really a laughing matter, is it?

What’s even worse about that series of clips is that if Rudy Gobert really is the best defender in the league, Joel Embiid should be MVP for how he dismantled him. Pair that with “offensively challenged” Ben Simmons dropping 42 on Gobert’s dome when Joel was out, and I’m highly skeptical Gobert is good at anything but rim protection against players he is way bigger than.

The thing that makes me especially furious about Ben getting snubbed for DPOY is the role “statsexuals” and graph-obsessed losers played in the whole operation.

The Sixers subreddit did not like it when I hit out against advanced analytics and catch-all stats, probably because they’re nerds and it hurt their feelings (one even claimed I didn’t finish high school. My bachelor’s degree laughed at that one pretty hard). Look what their complacency has led to. Another VORP, RAPTOR, and CHODE stat leader winning DPOY off of what an Excel spreadsheet says instead of his play on the court.

Gobert only won because rim protection is easier to quantify than perimeter defense. There are no stats for the shots people don’t take, the passes they don’t make. Sure, Rudy can block a 6’5″ guard that cooked Donovan Mitchell on his way to the rack. However, Ben Simmons makes sure that play doesn’t even happen.

Until people realize the way the defensive game is played is more important than the numbers on a piece of paper after the game, this soft ass bum will keep running away with awards based on nothing but math.

In the end, I love the snubs. Bring on the motivation. I guarantee you these voting tallies are hung up in the Sixers’ locker room. We saw Joel Embiid drop 40 points in 35 minutes after Jokic was announced MVP. The Hawks should be concerned about what Ben Simmons will do to them tomorrow after his DPOY snub.

They hate The Process. The best part is, we hate them even more.

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