{"id":33340,"date":"2023-05-03T22:22:19","date_gmt":"2023-05-03T22:22:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/nba-embiid-hopes-improbable-path\/"},"modified":"2023-05-03T22:23:50","modified_gmt":"2023-05-03T22:23:50","slug":"nba-embiid-hopes-improbable-path","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/nba-embiid-hopes-improbable-path\/","title":{"rendered":"NBA-Embiid hopes ‘improbable’ path to MVP will inspire"},"content":{"rendered":"

(Reuters) – National Basketball Association (NBA) MVP Joel Embiid hopes to be a role model of perseverance after overcoming extraordinary odds, the Philadelphia 76ers center said on Wednesday.<\/p>\n

The Cameroonian All-Star is only the second African to earn MVP honors, after Nigerian-American Hakeem Olajuwon from the Houston Rockets won for the 1993-1994 season, and said he never predicted a future in the NBA when he began playing.<\/p>\n

“The probability of someone like me you know, started playing basketball at 15, to get the chance to be the MVP of the league is, I’d say, negative-zero,” he said. “We don’t have a lot of opportunities back in Africa in general to get to this point. <\/p>\n

“But, you know, improbable doesn’t mean impossible.”<\/p>\n

The seven-foot titan led the Sixers to their third straight Eastern Conference semi-final this year, where they led the Boston Celtics 1-0 ahead of Wednesday’s Game 2.<\/p>\n

But his career almost never got off the ground. He nearly quit the sport months after going third overall in the 2014 draft, when his younger brother died in a car accident. <\/p>\n

“I felt like it was kind of my fault because I left Cameroon, I left, you know, my family. I felt like I should have been there to do something,” said Embiid, who missed the first two seasons of his career with a broken foot. <\/p>\n

“I’m just glad that I pushed through it and I’m here sitting in front of you guys having accomplished something that a lot of people don’t get the opportunity to.”<\/p>\n

Embiid, who came second in MVP voting to Denver Nuggets center Nikola Jokic in the last two seasons, produced an undeniable MVP campaign this time around, averaging a career-high 33.1 points per game, with 10.2 rebounds and 4.2 assists.<\/p>\n

\n

(Reporting by Amy Tennery in New York; Editing by Toby Davis)<\/p>\n

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(Reuters) – National Basketball Association (NBA) MVP Joel Embiid hopes to be a role model of perseverance after overcoming extraordinary odds, the Philadelphia 76ers center said on Wednesday. The Cameroonian All-Star is only the second African to earn MVP honors, after Nigerian-American Hakeem Olajuwon from the Houston Rockets won for the 1993-1994 season, and said […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":33341,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1219],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-33340","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-u-s-sports"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-content\/uploads\/Reuters_Direct_Media\/USOnlineReportSportsNews\/tagreuters.com2023binary_LYNXMPEJ420Z9-VIEWIMAGE.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33340","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=33340"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33340\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":33342,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33340\/revisions\/33342"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/33341"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=33340"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=33340"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=33340"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}