Seth Vigdor
Evan Turner saw reporters waiting by his locker Saturday night before the Celtics game against the Hawks. He jokingly said, “You guys want to ask me about Hinkie or something? Alright, come on. I got 15 of those 47 wins.” So it began. Turner spent some time with the reporters fielding questions about former Sixers general manager, Sam Hinkie, and even Joel Embiid.
Turner, of course, was selected with the second overall pick by the Sixers in the 2010 NBA Draft. He played few seasons with the team before being traded along with Lavoy Allen to the Indiana Pacers in exchange for Danny Granger and a second-round draft pick. Turner never lived up to his second pick value with the Sixers, but has now found some success in a sixth-man role with the Boston Celtics. And Granger never played for the Sixers. But that’s another story.
Back to Saturday night. The initial questions he took from the reporters were about the Sam Hinkie situation. Here’s what Turner had to say, courtesy of MassLive.com.
I didn’t read (the letter). A lot of people make assumptions on what they don’t know. One thing I didn’t know was (how well they’re set up for the draft). That’s somewhat ingenius. That could set them up great for the future. It’s just in the NBA, I don’t know what he had with (76ers owner) Josh Harris, but typically jobs, unless you’re a legend, jobs don’t last seven or eight years for a plan. I think if it does work out then he did set them up great, you know?”
However, this is where things started to get interesting. Joel Embiid’s name came up and from that Turner said the following.
“Embiid sounds like the next Olajuwon.”
The reporters of course followed up on that comment and asked him to expand on the comment. Turner talked a little about Embiid’s impressive body type.
I was like is he good, and they were like (nods vigorously). And I respect these people’s opinions. So I can only imagine, man. The kid went in-between-the-legs dunk at 7-feet. Bigs are hard to find. That coordination, and I’ve seen him hit 15 straight threes from the top (of the arc). Hopefully it works out for him because I’ve got so much respect for (76ers head coach) Brett (Brown), I’ve got so much respect for the staff that works there, and when Philly gets going like in the Iverson days it can be a special city.”
Man! Next season can’t come soon enough. My anticipation to see Embiid finally on the court in a Sixers uniform is through the roof. We finally received some good news to report about Embiid earlier in the week, so it’s only a matter of time before we find out whether Embiid is a stud or dud. In the meantime, we’ll have to wait for Embiid to make pop-up appearances in the City like he did on Friday for the Villanova Parade.