There’s still time to fix it, but this kind of sucks.
The NBA announced the reserves for the 2026 All-Star game and, despite his dominant month of January, Joel Embiid did not make the cut in the Eastern Conference. Instead, the backups will be Cleveland’s Donovan Mitchell, Atlanta’s Jalen Johnson, Indiana’s Pascal Siakam, Miami’s Norman Powell, Toronto’s Scottie Barnes and New York’s Karl-Anthony Towns.
The reasoning for this has to be game’s played, since Embiid’s production is now better than most of those guys, though doing so in about 10-15 less appearances. After dropping 40, on the Pelicans he’s up to 26.2 points per game and 7.5 rebounds on 59.9% true shooting. That really speaks to how effective he’s been inside since he’s still shooting 29% from behind the three-point line. Embiid has appeared in 28 games so far this season and 16 of the Sixers’ last 20. He averaged 29 points and eight rebounds a game in the 14 appearances he made in January.
This doesn’t entirely sink Embiid’s chances to earn his eighth All-Star selection, though. If Giannis Antetokounmpo, a starter for the East, is accurate with his own diagnosis, he’ll miss the game and the league will select his replacement.
There’s also a chance that as an international player, Embiid could be selected if the “Team World” needs more players to round out its roster. The fact that I — and many others — are still unsure of how those rosters quite work says a lot about the idea.
Perhaps this ends up being a best-of-both-worlds situation for Embiid. He still makes the game, but has the motivation from being snubbed initially to work with going forward.
