The 2019-20 NBA season went up in smoke along with most of the world in mid-March, which has buried some of the biggest subplots of a disappointing Sixers season for the time being. A new Jackie MacMullan story on Ben Simmons for ESPN changes that, focusing on the debate over his jump shot and all of the potential solutions to the problem.
Among many revelations — including MacMullan reporting that Simmons will be "good to go" whenever the NBA returns to play — there is a conversation regarding the options to grapple with Simmons' unwillingness to shoot. One such option has been a favorite choice of some fans for years, and evidently came up in offseason conversations between head coach Brett Brown and Simmons.
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We're talking about benching, a route his beloved high school coach says he would have chosen to take:
"If I were in charge of the Sixers, I'd tell him, 'If you don't take a pull-up jumper and a perimeter shot in each half -- I don't care about your percentages -- you're sitting,'" Boyle says.
That is precisely the conversation Brown claims he had with Simmons and his parents last summer. This is not just another family for Brown; he coached David Simmons from 1989 to 1993 on the Melbourne Tigers, and Brown has known Ben since he was an infant. When Ben Simmons missed his entire rookie season following foot surgery, he and Brown watched film of Magic Johnson together, plotting his future as a point guard. His reticence to take 3s has heightened tensions between them, as pressure from the front office to expand his range increases.
"I told Ben, 'If you aren't willing to shoot, then do I just bench you? Because I can do that,'" Brown says. "We could have gone that route or continue to coach him as it relates to spacing. We worked on the ability to use it as a choice to shoot the 3, catch and go, get in the paint, or find someone else.
"This was all discussed. I opted to take this path. I think only down the road will we be able to truly assess if it was the right one. In the meantime, he's a two-time All-Star, a kid that's gone from a college 4 to an NBA point guard. His story is a pretty darn good one." [ESPN]
This comes alongside more details on Simmons' backstory that create the case for benching him. Teammates at Montverde relayed stories of Simmons responding to being yelled at and held accountable by Kevin Boyle, who MacMullan says he still lists as his favorite coach to this day, and he even outright admitted in the story that he needs someone to keep him in check.
"My weakness is I need to have someone make me accountable," Simmons told MacMullan. "The goal is to be accountable to myself. That's been a bit tough. It takes time."
All of that adds up to a pretty big indictment of Brown's handling of the situation this season. Being able to have the sort of relationship Brown has with Simmons and his family is a potential asset, but in this case, it just stinks of being too close to the situation. It's one of the only big cards, really the biggest card, a coach can possibly play. Fretting over that choice with the player and his family ahead of time takes a lot of the sting out of it, especially if you opt not to use it and signal to the player you're going to bend that choice to their preferences.
Is it easy to bench a star player with no competent backup in any situation? Of course not. But there's an important difference between learning how individual players are best coaxed and allowing them to control the methods you use to bring the best out of him.
Brown's longevity has afforded him more power than he lets on, yet anecdotes like these reinforce what his biggest critics believe is the problem. Closeness to Simmons and his family is only useful if you can use it to get him to break out of his shell, and the other dynamics at play neuter Brown from laying down the law. Coaching stars with your job on the line is a lot different than weathering the storm with a bad, talent-light team tanking for high draft picks, and Brown has helped put himself in a position where some of his best options to teach are off of the table.
A bit of devil's advocate — these are nice things for Simmons and his loved ones to say about accountability sprinkled throughout MacMullan's story, but that also doesn't mean they're necessarily true. On many occasions when he has actually been pressed on his jumper in public, Simmons has responded with standoffishness and by digging his heels in further, a far cry from the story being sold here.
When Brown has decided to push him, as he did when he demanded one three per game in early December, Simmons reverted to the same habits he has had since entering the league. Saying you want something and showing you want something are two different things.
Brown, by the way, is not the only one who has tried to get through to Simmons in one form or another. MacMullan reported Tuesday that Simmons agreed to work with a sports psychologist, and his brother was open in the story about the mental component and its impact on Simmons' decisionmaking.
Even star center Joel Embiid chimed in, once again pointing out that he would like his running mate to let it fly to help him out down on the block.
"We've had conversations, especially when it comes to shooting," Embiid says. "Ben can help me a lot. I feel like I've helped him a lot with his game. People keep saying, 'Oh, you have to stop spending time on the 3-point line,' but I do it because Ben is such a good driver, going to basket, that I've got to help open that up for him.
"I would like if he would do the same for me, to start shooting [3s]. But I also know how uncomfortable he is with it." [ESPN]
That is the clearest Embiid has ever delivered this message, painting the same picture so many on the outside have for years. Embiid understands the problem like anyone else — hell, Simmons seems to understand the problem like anyone else — and it still hasn't changed the approach Simmons takes within a game.
All told, it's an interesting look at a player who is equal parts exhilarating and exhausting. Simmons freely admits he doesn't let the public in, sometimes to his own detriment, and that the decision to shoot is ultimately in his hands. Whenever this season comes back, if this season comes back, that will continue to be the case, Brown or no Brown.
It is a story worth your time now more than ever, and perhaps this time spent alone to think will give Simmons the motivation he needs to finally start letting it fly. But you are certainly justified if you're holding out for evidence instead of believing every promise that comes down the pipeline.
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