How is Jahlil Okafor still on the Sixers? I was told like a million times by a million different NBA pundits that he was gonna get traded, hell, he was even seen shaking hands with all the coaches and stuff and then he didn’t go on the team’s next road trip. Either one of those things is a pretty decent sign someone’s been traded. Combined? Done deal. Done frickin’ deal. I didn’t know which team he was going to end up with after the All-Star break, but I knew it wouldn’t be Philly.
Nope. Instead, they traded Nerlens Noel, which is questionable, but fine. At least they cleared out their center logjam a little bit. That was the most important thing, and as things moved along it became clear that the return of Big Jah wasn’t going to be all that good.
Jahlil has paid off Philly’s begrudging commitment to him by scoring 28 points, including a game-winning-were-it-not-for-Carmelo’s-bitch-ass shot with 9 seconds left. He’s still got all the moves he had in his rookie year, as you can see. I think I even saw Joel Embiid congratulating him after his clutch basket. I thought they hated each other? Or at least Embiid hated Big Jah, never mind if it was reciprocated or not? Some NBA twitter personality told me they hated each other. Who am I supposed to believe? They’ve been wrong about everything so far.