Are the Sixers Actually Better Without Joel Embiid?

Any conversation surrounding the Sixers these days starts with praise for Tyrese Maxey. Partially because of how well he's played. Partially because of the obstacles he's navigating to help drive winning with Joel Embiid constantly sidelined.

It's a fair and reasonable conversation to have.

There is no doubt that the constant uncertainty surrouding Embiid's game availability has to wear on everyone involved, regardless of the smiles they put on their faces and the words they say.

But then the conversation devolves. "Embiid is dead weight," some say. "They have to get off his money," others offer. The latest topic turning the locals into their own version of First Take is whether or not the Sixers are actually better without Embiid.

So, are they?

On SI analyzed 20 different metrics to determine whether the Sixers are, in fact, better without Embiid.

Before we dive in, a quick note — Unless stated otherwise, all stats via NBA.com, PBPStats, or Cleaning The Glass.

Let's start with the basics

You all are familiar with offensive rating, defensive rating and net rating. Here's where things stand.

	Embiid on court	Embiid off court	Net
Offensive rating	118.1	113.9	4.3
Defensive rating	115.9	114.5	-1.4
Net rating	2.2	-0.7	2.9

I do think the off-court numbers here may be skewed just a bit by a pair of beatdowns — one to the Orlando Magic and another to the Oklahoma City Thunder. But none of these should really surprise anyone. Even if Embiid's individual offensive efficiency has been shaky from time to time, his production and gravity boost the team's offense. His defensive limitations have not gone away and they may never go away. So the off-court number has lingered closer to neutral this season.

Let's dig a little deeper now.

The health of the offense

	Embiid on court	Embiid off court	Net
TOV %	13.7	13.1	-0.6
Rim rate	28.8%	32.7%	-3.9%
Three-point rate	43.9%	40.8%	3.1%
FTA per 100 poss	28.5	24.8	3.7

Assist rate was not included here. You could argue it should've been. I would contend that assist rate doesn't tell us all that much when the team, as a whole, ranks 28th in effective field goal percentage, 30th in rim accuracy, 28th in mid-range accuracy and 18th in three-point accuracy. Embiid may make some good or even great passes. But if his teammates don't make shots, which they don't, it doesn't really matter and the data gets skewed.

But it makes sense that a high-usage, high-turnover player produces a team-wide higher turnover rate when he's on the court.

Analytically speaking, you want a relatively high rim rate, a relatively high three-point rate and a relatively low mid-range volume. The Sixers will never follow those rules of efficiency while Embiid is on the roster because of how comfortable a mid-range shooter he is.

There is a problem. Embiid has maintained the mid-range shot diet as if he's still a wizard between the three-point arc and the rim. His accuracy in the mid-range, while improving, is not near recovering to where it was prior to the meniscus injury of two seasons ago.

So you could argue that his shot selection makes Philadelphia a less efficient offense when he's on the floor because it's heavy on analytically inefficient shots and he's not paying that off with enough makes.

Because he's trying to give way to Maxey's lead on offense, he's functioning as a spacer and a flare man out of the pick-and-pop. So Embiid is taking more threes.

The last item in diagnosing the health of the offense is the team's free throw rate.

I think this measure of free throws is excellent because it accounts for more than just shooting fouls drawn. It accounts for the fouls drawn after the team gets into the bonus, with shooting fouls being just one avenue of getting to the line at that point. Maxey's ascent to superstardom and the respect that comes with that has probable helped boost the non-Embiid number a bit. But still a factor that the big man influences heavily.

Scoring efficiencies

We talked about rim and three-point rates above. It doesn't really matter what your rates are if you don't actually make the shots. Here's what's happening when the ball actually goes up.

	Embiid on court	Embiid off court	Net
Rim %	64.3	60.7	3.6
Two-point %	52.1	50.4	1.7
Non-rim two %	39.4	38.6	0.8
Non-rim two frequency	29.1	26.2	2.9
Three-point %	37.6	34.7	2.9

All of these favor Embiid, and it's not surprising. When Embiid is on the court, he's operating at the nail or elbows and often attracting attention from more than one defender. Teammates have some freedom to cut and relocate, and even get off more open looks as Embiid fires the ball around the floor to beat the extra attention.

To put into context just how much Embiid is changing with those scoring efficiencies, 37.6 percent on threes would rank fifth in the NBA. 34.7 percent is 24th. 64.3 percent at the rim would rank 25th, and 60.7 percent would rank below the Sixers' currently-30th-ranked efficiency at the rim.

Surprisingly, even in a down year, the (in)efficiency on non-rim twos isn't changing much for Philadelphia regardless of Embiid's availability. Embiid's presence does make for a five-spot jump in the rankings on frequency of the non-rim twos, though.

You can debate the merits of the non-rim two. Analytics would prefer rim twos, threes and free throws. It is an efficient shot if you can make it 48-52 percent of the time, but Embiid is not there at this juncture.

Now to the other side of the floor

The health of the defense

	Embiid on court	Embiid off court	Net
Opp. TOV %	12.3	15.3	-3
Opp. rim frequency	30.9%	32.7%	1.8%
Opp. three-point rate	43%	40.2%	2.8%

The first thing worth noting is that I excluded a free throw category here because none of the resources used a metric that closely represented free throw attempts. PBPStats did not provide a free throw attempts per 100 possessions for the opposition. It was unclear whether NBA.com's metric only included the minutes that Embiid sat in games he played or factored in games he didn't play at all. Cleaning The Glass only measures by free throws made, not free throws attempted. The one thing to say is that when a defensive player's presence causes rim frequency to drop and three-point frequency to rise, logic would suggest that the opponent's free throw rate would drop, too. You're not going to get many fouls shooting jumpers. There is a correlation between attacking the rim more and getting to the foul line more often.

The second thing to note is that the net figures here do not show negative nets for numbers that would clearly come out negative by simple math. The net column in this case reflects whether or not the number favors Embiid's presence.

Philadelphia's brand of defense without Embiid is more energetic and connected on screens, leading to more impact on the ball in passing and driving lanes. When Embiid is on the court, however, the Sixers are often in drop coverage, allowing a soft spot in the middle of the floor as Embiid favors the rim. That also has to mean that there is less connectivity on screens, allowing for less impact on the ball. Therefore, while it obviously doesn't favor Embiid's presence, it makes sense that the opposition commits more turnovers when he's off the court.

The opponent rim frequency is where people should be surprised. Embiid developed a reputation for being an elite rim protector. So now that there's some drop-off from the level of deterrent he used to be, many have fairly concluded that he's not what he used to be. But that is getting conflated with his rim protection not helping the team. And that's where the number doesn't match the eye test or the argument. Embiid's rim protection is, in fact, still helping the Sixers, just maybe not to the degree that it used to.

As for the opponent three-point rate, you could argue that it's better or worse that teams are attempting more threes with Embiid on the court than with him off it. I tend to subscribe to the idea that you'll play the odds of a guy missing a three most of the time, whether he's guarded or not. If I were coaching a team, I'd want to eliminate the highest-percentage shots, which are always at the rim. So if the three-point volume goes up with Embiid on the court, I would lean toward that being a good thing.

Opponent scoring efficiencies

Teams may be taking more threes and fewer shots at the rim when Embiid is on the court, but are they making them?

	Embiid on court	Embiid off court	Net
Opp. rim %	58.9	68.1	9.2
Opp. two-point %	52.1	55.4	3.3
Opp. three-point %	36.1	33.4	-2.7

While quite surprising, I was willing to accept that Embiid's presence is still affecting shots at the rim to the tune of a 13.5-percent drop-off from what happens when he's not on the court. This also does not mean he's serving as the rim protector. Embiid could be guarding a non-shooter and effectively patrolling the floor while his frontcourt mate is the one guarding the rim. Regardless of scheme, this is just quantifying what happens to the opposition's aptitude at the rim when Embiid is in the game.

What I was stunned to find out was that opponents shooting 58.9 percent at the rim when Embiid is on the court, when scaled to the entire NBA, would actually be the best rim defense in the league. Cleaning The Glass has Oklahoma City's defense allowing 59.6-percent shooting at the rim. That leads the league. Since this subset of the data was from PBPStats, I checked their provider of NBA tracking data — NBA.com. They, too, have Oklahoma City's defense leading the league in field goal percentage in the restricted area, at 60.6 percent. The number is slightly different, but the ranking holds.

The only thing here that doesn't favor Embiid is the opponent three-point shooting. It makes a ton of sense and probably correlates with another metric we mentioned earlier. If the turnover rate is higher with Embiid on the court, that probably means teams are getting better looks at threes as they run in transition. Also, just because the Sixers are a drop-heavy team with Embiid on the court does not mean there isn't help defense. The other guys on the floor are pinching on driving lanes to try to help thwart the rim pressure. That's probably leading to some stretched defenders having long closeouts to shooters if the pass is made.

We do have one last thing to discuss.

Rebounding

You can't finish any complete analysis of a big man without talking about rebounding. Here's where things are with and without Embiid.

	Embiid on court	Embiid off court	Net
DREB %	71.2	68.7	2.5
OREB %	27.9	32.1	-4.2

Embiid has never realized his full potential as a rebounder. We all know that. But the team is still putting up strong defensive rebounding numbers with him on the court. Not only are they a better defensive rebounding team with him on than with him off, but that 71.2-percent defensive rebounding rate would rank fifth in the NBA, according to NBA.com.

The one thing Embiid isn't going to be able to pleasantly surprise anyone with is the fall-off in offensive rebounding. It does make sense, though. A jump-shooting big man who starts most of his touches some 15 feet from the rim isn't going to be near the rim to rebound the basketball that often. Of course that number rises when the other options playing center behind Embiid are not really stretching the floor.

We can say that 12 of the metrics definitively prove that Embiid is helping the Sixers. Six prove that the team is better with him off the court. Two are debatable and up to preference.

It should matter quite a bit that, in context, the team's interior defense is still quite good when Embiid is on the court. The one thing that is very apparent at the end of this exercise is that it is provably inaccurate to say that Embiid's defensive offering isn't good anymore. It's still impactful. Maybe even quite impactful.

It's just not what it once was, and so it is perceived as having left him.

There's a conversation to be had about whether Embiid's inconsistent availability slows or even stalls team chemistry. Perhaps, in that way, he is hurting the Sixers. Perhaps his contract, combined with that inconsistent availability, makes for an opportunity cost in roster construction that is worth consideration.

But in every provable way, no, the team is not actually better without him.