Only demons and vampires blame Joel Embiid for the Sixers playoff struggles

I promised myself I wasn’t going to acknowledge this kind of garbage anymore. Every time Joel Embiid misses a game, the same talking heads crawl out of the woodwork with the same tired takes about how you can’t win with him and you can’t trust him to be available.

Kendrick Perkins went on First Take and said “you can’t win a championship with Joel Embiid being one of the faces of your franchise” because of his injury history. Original stuff, Kendrick. Really groundbreaking analysis from a guy who averaged eight points a game for his career and now gets paid to yell on television.

Kendrick Perkins talking nonsense about Joel Embiid

"You can't win a championship with Joel Embiid being one of the faces of your franchise. … You can't trust him to be available."

—@KendrickPerkins on Joel Embiid's injury history 🤕 pic.twitter.com/JlvS2bjlDf

— First Take (@FirstTake) May 7, 2026

At some point you have to tell these people to shut the fuck up because the narrative they’re pushing is not only lazy, it’s intentionally misdirected. Every single one of these media personalities wants to blame Joel Embiid for the Sixers’ problems while completely ignoring the person who is actually responsible for the state of this roster.

Blame Daryl Morey. Not Joel Embiid.

Weird how nobody wants to talk about Daryl Morey, right?

The Sixers were sellers at the NBA Trade Deadline. They knew exactly what they had with Joel Embiid heading into this season. How couldn’t they? Everyone knew the injuries would come.

Everyone knew Joel Embiid hadn’t played in six or more consecutive games since 2023. Everyone knew his body was a ticking time bomb that required careful management and a roster built to absorb his absences.

Here’s what everyone also knew. This team had zero bench. Any backup center has never been good enough to come close to Embiid’s production or stability. The Sixers’ record without Embiid has been an absolute joke for years.

The gap between Embiid being on the floor and Embiid being off the floor is the size of the Grand Canyon and Morey has never adequately addressed it. Not once. Not in a single offseason or trade deadline since he arrived in Philadelphia.

The Sixers needed bench depth. Morey didn’t get it. The Sixers needed a reliable backup center. Morey didn’t get one. The Sixers needed insurance for the inevitable Embiid absences that everyone on the planet could see coming. Morey sold at the deadline instead. He “sold high” on Jared McCain and now the only bench guard we have in the playoffs is Quentin Grimes.

He punted on this season knowing full well that Embiid’s health was going to be an issue and then sat back and watched the predictable outcome unfold.

That’s not on Embiid. That’s on the front office.

Joel Embiid Has Given This City Everything

Joel Embiid came back from an emergency appendectomy three weeks after surgery. He dropped 33 points in a Game 7 on the road in Boston. He hit a dagger three with the lead down to one and waved off TD Garden.

He led the greatest comeback in Sixers playoff history while his body was still healing from surgery. He played through a hip contusion and ankle injuries because he refuses to let this team lose without him on the floor.

The man has played through a torn meniscus, a broken orbital bone, Bell’s Palsy, and an appendectomy in the span of four postseasons. His toughness is not the issue. His commitment is not the issue. His talent is not the issue. He is a former MVP and one of the most dominant players in NBA history when healthy.

The issue is that the organization around him has failed repeatedly to build a roster capable of winning when he’s not on the court. The issue is that Daryl Morey keeps constructing teams with paper-thin depth and then watching the whole thing collapse the second Embiid misses time. The issue is that the Sixers have known for years that Embiid is going to miss games and they’ve done nothing meaningful to prepare for it.

Kendrick Perkins doesn’t want to talk about that because blaming Embiid is easier, louder, and gets more clicks. Saying “you can’t win with Embiid” is a lazy take that requires zero research and zero understanding of roster construction. Saying “Daryl Morey has failed to build a competent supporting cast around a generational talent” is accurate but doesn’t fit into a First Take soundbite.

The Series Is Two Games In

It’s also worth mentioning that this is a seven-game series and the Sixers are down 2-0 after a Game 1 blowout on 24 hours rest and a Game 2 without Embiid where they should have won but collapsed in the final five minutes.

The Knicks did what they were supposed to do at home. That’s it. The Sixers were down 3-1 against the Celtics and everyone on television said the series was over. Perkins probably said the series was over. Then Embiid came back and the Sixers won three straight.

Embiid gets banged up, misses a game, and suddenly the entire media ecosystem resets to “you can’t win with this guy.” For a brief moment after the Boston series, Embiid finally got his flowers. The world acknowledged what he did. Then he gets hurt again paired with an ugly Game 1 loss and now we’re right back to the same bullshit being spewed all over social media and national television. The cycle never ends with these people.

Embiid is not the problem. He has never been the problem. The problem is Daryl Morey and the Sixers organization failing time and time again to address roster issues, spend money where it matters, and show a pulse when it comes to building a team that can actually compete for a championship.

Until that changes, the Sixers will keep running into the same wall every postseason and the talking heads will keep blaming the wrong person.

Direct your anger literally anywhere else within the organization just keep it away from the guy who just led a 3-1 comeback on a surgically repaired body. Embiid deserves better than this franchise and he certainly deserves better than Kendrick Perkins.

Join The Chase