PHILADELPHIA -- The Philadelphia 76ers have seen Joel Embiid on the floor far too often across his 11 years playing in this city. The organization and the entire city held their collective breaths when he was on the floor in pain in the early minutes of their 123-112 win over the Toronto Raptors. He was grabbing at his right knee and he limped off the floor and into the locker room.
"I thought, just from what I could see from where I was that, it might have been something serious," coach Nick Nurse said after the loss. "I thought he was like holding his knee, right, which could be anything, fairly serious. But, I guess he just knocked knees and that’s very painful for a bit and they checked him out and he was fine. But I was like it’s not an ankle.
He wasn’t hobbling around on an ankle or reaching for his ankle. He was grabbing his knee and that always gets you really nervous."
Embiid, of course, has had a history of knee injuries that have limited him. The big fella has worked so hard around the clock in order to make sure he's ready to be there for the Sixers when the time calls for it. To see him in pain and grabbing at his knee set off alarms for his teammates.
"It sucks to see him, but you know, I don't like--I tell him all the time," began VJ Edgecombe. "I don't like seeing him lay on the floor. I'm kind of pessimistic at times. You know, because you never know what happened when somebody just laying on the floor because obviously I ain’t see what happened. But for him to go back and then come back out obviously shows his heart."
Instead of sitting back in the locker room, Embiid came back out and scored 20 points on 7-for-17 shooting and tormented the Raptors for stretches. It wasn't a classic dominant Embiid game, but the Sixers will certainly take it. Even if he gave everybody a bit of a scare.
"He could have just been a guy playing anyway and sit out, but it just shows his heart," added Edgecombe. "It's kind of like I think it was like a mini collision. So that's something that obviously, thank God, wasn't like the you know something that could sit him down. But yeah, I hate. He knows that I hate seeing him on the floor. I always tell him all the time, just please don't just don't fall. Please don't."
Joel Embiid collapses with an apparent knee injury
— Hoop Central (@TheHoopCentral) November 13, 2026
Prayers up. 🙏 pic.twitter.com/sf2vZj48Cf
Tyrese Maxey has seen it all with Embiid. He is the guy in the locker room who has been teammates with Embiid the longest and while he was somewhat worried when he saw the big fella go down, he had a feeling it wasn't going to be too serious.
"I knew that he didn't like twist it or anything," Maxey stated. "I knew it was like a knee to knee. So, I wasn't too worried because that's just a contusion. So he kept saying, ‘I just got kneed.’ So that that still hurts though."
It speaks to how badly Embiid wants to play and perform for the Sixers and the city of Philadelphia. The big fella wants it. He has talked the talk and now he's walking the walk. His teammates respect him for that and the Sixers will be looking for more of that.
“He was very very motivated to play," Nurse finished. "It was hard to get him out for his rest, scheduled rest tonight. Which, is a good problem. It’s a good problem, sometimes, yeah."
This article originally appeared on Sixers Wire: Multiple 76ers react to seeing Joel Embiid go down, return vs. Raptors
