Maybe one day Philadelphia sports fans will forgive Ben Simmons for not taking the court at all for the 76ers last season, not shooting in four consecutive fourth quarters, and the play in which he passed the ball to the only Sixer who was arguably a worse shooter than him instead of dunking on Trae Young.

Stranger things have happened. I’m sure no one in 1967 thought that Mike Ditka would return to the Chicago Bears and win a Super Bowl as their head coach. Jay Z and Nas have recorded several songs together.

On Tuesday night, Ben Simmons will be making his first appearance in Philadelphia in a uniform other than that of the home team. The fans are going to be on full “Ether” and “Takeover” vibes from the moment he emerges from the hotel. It will be just like the last time the Brooklyn Nets played in Philly last season and Simmons was hurt. But hopefully, with the fans able to truly voice their displeasure at an active Simmons, maybe some closure can be brought to a disappointing period of 76ers basketball.

Simmons wasn’t simply a No. 1 overall pick. He was considered a potential generational talent. Longer than LeBron James, but with all of the court vision. Simmons was drafted to direct Philly’s offense from Day 1, but he broke his foot and missed the entire 2016-17 season.

The next season, Simmons won Rookie of the Year and the 76ers had their highest win total — 52 — since they went to the NBA Finals in 2001. They lost in the second round of the 2018 playoffs to the Boston Celtics, but it appeared that Embiid and Simmons had a bright future in store. Jimmy Butler was added prior to the 2018-19 season and pushed the eventual NBA Champion Toronto Raptors to the brink.

Instead of keeping the three together with Tobias Harris, Butler was traded and the keys to the offense were again firmly in Simmons’ hands. Ask a 76ers fan, and they will likely tell you that he steered the team into a tree.

Rumblings of discontent plagued Philadelphia as did Simmons’ ghastly free throw shooting numbers and refusal to shoot outside of the paint. The Sixers were atrocious in the bubble 2020 playoffs, after which Brett Brown was fired and Doc Rivers was hired. In the COVID-shortened 2020-21 season the 76ers finished in first place in the East. Embiid was an All-NBA performer and Simmons was first team All-Defense.

I listed all of that to show not just how much success Simmons had with the 76ers, but also that last season was only his sixth in the NBA, and he didn’t even play in his first one.

Losing in the second round to a team that crept into the fifth seed, after firing a coach mid-season, there had to be an explanation for that epic failure. Yes, the blame went to Doc Rivers and Embiid, but that aborted dunk was treated like the final judgment on Simmons’ career. After the Game 7 loss, his coach and star teammate did little to try and provide a defense before the jury of public opinion.

Simmons admitted in September on The Old Man and the Three that he was mentally struggling both during the series, and in the months following. He also wasn’t feeling enough support from the organization and that bothered him as well. It all led up to that practice when everything boiled over. Rivers kicked him out of practice and that was it for Simmons’ time in Philly, or at least it should have been.

Two days after that, Philly General Manager Daryl Morey decided that, in 2021, a great idea to show strength was on local sports talk radio, where he said a trade could take years. By years he meant until the trade deadline and he got back a hobbled James Harden, Paul Millsap, and two first-round picks — one of which is in 2027 and top-eight protected.

Simmons chose not to play for the 76ers. It wasn’t the back injury that completely ended last season for him after the trade, he didn’t want to play for them anymore. A parting of ways would have been best for both sides, but Morey hung on until the last minute. In this process, he lit his team’s season on fire, and didn’t significantly upgrade the roster. The team’s biggest improvement is Tyrese Maxey taking another step this season, which still hasn’t been enough to avoid a rough start.

Holding on also forced Philadelphia sports fans to get hit in the head daily with the fact that a player refused to play for them. Combine that with bad feelings from the last time he did wear a Philadelphia jersey, and of course, they had a tidal wave of hate for Simmons in a game he didn’t even play in when the Nets visited last season.

This time they get to see him get introduced in the starting lineups, dribble the ball up the court, and shoot free throws. It’s going to be LeBron’s first game in Cleveland with the Miami Heat type of energy.

Maybe it’s necessary though, for all sides to have this moment. For Simmons to go up against Rivers and Embiid, and for him to accept — within reason – all that the fans have to dish out. He recently told ESPN’s Ramona Shelburne that it felt good to express himself on the podcast, and is dealing with whatever he needs to “day by day.”

There is a lot of history between Simmons and the 76ers that took place in a short period of time. Award-winning highs and ugly playoff-upset lows. This game might go a long way towards everyone eventually becoming fully at peace with what happened, and maybe even help get both of these teams — albeit with the Nets having way more public internal drama than the 76ers these days — on a run back towards the top of the East.

The 2023 MLB Hall of Fame ballots were sent out yesterday.

This is a pretty weak set of contestants. Gone are the days of bickering over the eligibility of Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens, and Curt Schilling. Now, the argument becomes “Are there even 10 people worthy of Hall of Fame distinction?”

For me personally, there are. There are plenty. Between Álex Rodríguez and Manny Ramirez alone, I’d probably have two guys on my ballot that most voters won’t. I’d also throw Todd Helton, Bobby Abreu (I have my reasons), Jeff Kent, Scott Rolen, Billy Wagner, and Andruw Jones on there for sure. Maybe K-Rod could make his way onto my ballot depending on how hard the Christmas spirit hit me, but it’d take a lot of eggnog and goodwill for that to happen. Of course, none of this matters since I still don’t have a ballot, but I did leave one notable name off — Carlos Beltrán.

If I’m being upfront and honest, I wouldn’t leave Beltrán off for lack of qualifications. He was a great defender, a well-above-average bat at a traditionally non-offensive position, had four seasons with 30-plus home runs, and won a World Series. The reason I’d leave him off is that everyone else will likely vote for him despite his involvement in the 2017 Astros’ sign-stealing scandal.

You might be thinking: “Jon, you have Rodríguez and Ramirez on your ballot. Clearly, you don’t care about cheating.” Right you are! DING DING! Well, sort of, anyway. I care about consistency from the voters’ standpoint. If one cheater doesn’t get in, zero should get in, but in the baseball world’s never-ending quest to rid any of the 2017 Astros of blame, the Hall of Fame voters are clearly letting certain types of cheating go by without repercussions.

Beltrán is widely regarded as one of the masterminds behind the Astros’ cheating scandal. He was struggling early in the early parts of the season, to the tune of a .231/.285/.409 triple-slash through the first three months of the season. He needed an advantage, and in an interview with YES this year, he claimed that he and his Astros’ teammates thought they were merely “ahead of the curve,” and they would’ve stopped if they were informed what they were doing was illegal. This is obviously a stupid excuse, and even if it were a viable excuse, it wouldn’t be viewed as such by the Baseball Writers’ Association of America (BBWAA), who’s routinely shot down Hall of Fame aspirations from players who have claimed that they unknowingly took PEDs in the pros.

No players from that 2017 Astros team were punished, except Beltrán, who’d retired by the time the full story came out in late 2019. Beltrán was set to become the manager of the New York Mets, but once his involvement in the Astros’ scandal became apparent, he was forced to step down. Maybe voters believe that was punishment enough for Beltrán and that’s why he’s being seriously considered for the Hall. I don’t buy it though.

I believe voters are looking at Beltrán’s career and thinking, “Well, this was only one season. He was a Hall of Famer before 2017.” That’s terribly hypocritical though. Do you know who else was a Hall of Famer before cheating? Barry Bonds. We don’t know when he started juicing, but the consensus was that he started around 1999-2000, right before arguably the greatest four-year run in MLB history.

Prior to that 2000 season, Bonds had already accrued three MVP awards, eight Gold Gloves, 445 home runs, 1,299 RBI, 460 stolen bases, and 163 OPS-plus across 14 seasons. That’s more years than Matt Cain, Huston Street, Jered Weaver, J.J. Hardy, Jacoby Ellsbury, and Mike Napoli played and they’re all on the Hall of Fame ballot, thus, they’ve played long enough to warrant consideration.

The point is that if Beltrán gets allowed in despite his involvement in a cheating scandal, it creates a slippery slope that allows voters to determine which types of cheating are allowed in baseball. Why would anyone refrain from cheating if it won’t affect their legacy? I’m personally for letting everyone in unless their cheating was abhorrent and during an era where cheating wasn’t well-known and still brushed under the rug (like it was during the Steroid Era; Bud Selig is in the Hall of Fame after all). However, as long as one cheater isn’t allowed in, no cheaters should be, thus I find it hard to imagine a world where Beltrán finds himself in Cooperstown any time soon.

The voters have put themselves in a lose-lose situation. Either they induct Beltrán and look like hypocrites, or they make sure Beltrán doesn’t get in, effectively preventing a very talented player from getting the legacy send-off he deserves. I’d bet that the voters will opt for the latter. It’s a shame, but in the name of fairness, it’s what should happen.

The Dallas Mavericks’ struggles this season are well-documented and likely won’t be put to rest anytime soon. Their All-World leader, Luka Dončić, is off to another hot start, but that’s only translated into a 9-7 record, and the team barely keeping their heads above water. While Dončić is playing at an MVP level, he’s failed to bring his team along for the ride and make them a better unit.

Dončić recently became the second-fastest player in the history of the NBA to record 50 career triple-doubles. Watching “The Grillmaster” play is like a one-man demolition derby. He can do so many things and affect a game in so many ways offensively, but he still isn’t completely trusting in those around him.

Luka leads the NBA in scoring over the first month averaging 33.5 points per game. The Mavs rank 25th in the association in scoring at 109.1 ppg while ranking last in assists per game with 20.8. Dončić is taking that me against the world attitude to another level, and as usual, it’s to the team’s detriment.

However, we cannot place all the blame on the shoulders of Dončić. The front office and head coach Jason Kidd should also be held accountable. While it seemed like the Mavs had turned the corner last year with their improbable run to the Western Conference Finals, they’ve taken massive steps back early this season.

Quite frankly, Dallas has swung and missed when it comes to surrounding its star with other playmakers. It either hasn’t worked out when they have, or they’ve failed to keep those players on the roster.

A prime example of this is the emergence of Jalen Brunson as Luka’s running mate and No. 2 option last season. Brunson carried the Mavs through the first round of the postseason, with Dončić missing half the series against the Utah Jazz. Then the offseason and free agency period rolled around, and it was a foregone conclusion that Brunson was heading to New York, where he now resides as a Knick. Mavericks’ owner Mark Cuban barely seemed to put up any fight attempting to keep Brunson on the payroll.

Then there’s the Kristaps Porzingis deal that flopped last year. Porzingis clearly isn’t the “unicorn” he was once billed as. His frustration playing alongside Dončić was glaring. Porzingis and the Mavs had seen enough, and the unicorn was traded to Washington at the trade deadline last season for Spencer Dinwiddie and Davis Bertrand. Dinwiddie was a nice addition, but he can’t be the second option on a team with championship aspirations.

Dallas also traded for former Houston Rockets rising star Christian Wood over the summer, and he was supposed to be the answer in helping the Mavs capitalize on what they began last season. So far, that hasn’t been the reality in Dallas with Wood on the roster. For some reason, Kidd has chosen not to play Wood as much in the second half of games this year. In an overtime loss to the Thunder, Wood never touched the floor in OT.

“We left C Wood out there with that group, and it didn’t go well on either end,” Kidd said of Wood sitting late in the game.

You traded for this player, so you need to give him a chance to get acclimated and mesh with your star and the rest of his teammates. The Mavs are expected to be playoff contenders, and they’ll need Wood if they plan to make another deep run like last season.

Eventually, Dončić needs to decide whether he wants to be remembered as another all-time great scorer or if he wants to be an all-time great player who learned how to make his teammates better and win titles. Michael Jordan had to figure that out, and once he began to trust his team, the Bulls broke through and became a championship team. Dončić isn’t Jordan, but he is in that mold of wanting to take on the world by himself as Jordan was early on.

That one-on-one streetball mentality doesn’t win in today’s NBA. It never really has. Look no further than players like James Harden, Kyrie Irving, Kevin Durant, Russell Westbrook, etc. Durant won when he played a system that moved the ball, and he wasn’t happy about that at times. Irving won riding LeBron James’ coattails, and that’s not an overstatement. Dončić will have to learn trust. Until then, Luka will be another flashy high-volume scorer who continues to come up short in the postseason. 

Remember when photos of a shredded Mac Jones circulated before the season? Patriots fans were so hyped by the Mac-churian Candidate’s transformation that they gave him a standing ovation the first time he ran out on the field in training camp.

Coming off of a strong-ish rookie season, throwing for 3,800 yards and 22 TDs while leading New England to a 10-7 record, the hope was Jones could make a leap to a level above game manager, or at the very least, be the same level game manager.

Yeah, about that.

Not only is he worse than last year, but his production has been as bad as Zach Wilson, the standard for shitty quarterbacks this season. After seven games each, Wilson has four passing TDs to five picks, and Jones’ TD-INT ratio is four to seven. Mac has better yardage outputs, but not by much — 1,386 yards to 1,279 on the season, good for 198 and 182 yards per outing respectively.

There’s a reason Bill Belichick pulled Jones for Bailey Zappe in a high-profile Monday night loss to the Bears last month. However, the blame doesn’t fall on the quarterback. It’s on the head coach.

This is what an offense looks like when it doesn’t have a coordinator/is entrusted to two coaches who I wouldn’t let pour a bowl of cereal. I even wrote as much when it became apparent that Matt Patricia and Joe Judge were going to be responsible for Jones’, umm, growth:

“I’m not sure Joe Judge and Matt Patricia could fit a loveseat through a double door if they were the two men who arrived with your moving truck in the greater Boston area. The two colossal failures as NFL head coaches were a combined 23-52-1 in nearly five seasons with their respective teams. If you ask a Giants fan about Judge, or a Lions fan about Patricia, their response is going to be largely negative — and that’s if they utter actual words and not just give a thumbs down and make a fart noise.

“So, it’s a wonder why Bill Belichick has entrusted the development of Mac Jones to tweedle dee and tweedle idiot. The reports out of Patriots camp are of a frustrated, overwhelmed, soul-searching offense, one requiring motivational speeches and a designated play caller.”

My material may be recycled, but my jokes remain accurate. Coincidentally enough, accuracy — specifically completion percentage — is what Pats’ loyalists will point to as a sign that Jones has actually improved this year.

Alright. Well, watch this montage of Mac’s completions against the Jets last week, and tell me which throw isn’t safe.

Perhaps the segment of my Patricia-Judge rant that would’ve been more enlightening was the bit about the endless procession of screen passes that was the Giants’ game plan under Judge.

Even though Patricia is calling the plays, the agreed-upon approach to the offense can at best be described as “creatively conservative” — and the biggest case of “helicopter coaching” I’ve ever seen at worst.

Yes, Jones is hitting his receivers almost 70 percent of the time. That said, pretty much every advanced metric illustrates a quarterback who’s either petrified of making a mistake/getting benched, or being coddled like he can’t throw more than 15 yards downfield.

Jones’ average air yards per completion is 5.4. That means the ball travels an average of 5.4 yards past the line of scrimmage per completion. In his final year when he could barely hit a receiver more than 10 yards deep, Drew Brees had a CAY/Cmp of 5.3. For context, Patrick Mahomes has a 6.1 this season, and usually lives in the sixes for his career. The NFL’s leading passer Tua Tagovailoa has an 8.3, which is fucking ridiculous and a great example of a coach having faith in his QB.

It helps to have Tyreek Hill and Jaylen Waddle, but if Mike McDaniel’s offense is on the cutting edge of innovation, the Pats are still reliant on AOL to tell them if they have mail. The thing that stood out to me in those Jones-Jets highlights — and I use “stood out” liberally — is that Rhamondre Stevenson can’t be tackled by one man.

I understand wanting to lean on a running back like that, and Damien Harris is a great second option in the backfield. Yet New England is still 17th in rushing per game while clocking in at bottom 10 in total offense and passing yards, and bottom 13 in scoring. If you want to talk about an offensive line that’s allowed 28 sacks, which is bottom 10 in the league, or discuss the overpaid skill guys at receiver and tight end, I’ll listen.

What I will not entertain is this massive regression at quarterback being all on Jones. Belichick has earned the right to be arrogant. When you’ve won as much as him, you get the benefit of the doubt.

Not this time. This situation is further compounded when you read that Belichick passed over a promising assistant — the only one who he wouldn’t let other teams interview during the offseason — in Nick Caley to give the reins to Judge Joe Patricia. And that Caley didn’t sign an extension likely due to the snub, it’s even more of a disaster that could have already been categorized as unmitigated.

This was supposed to be the year Dallas returned to glory, with Tony Romo leading the way with a high-powered offense featuring Terrell Owens, Jason Witten, and Marion Barber pounding the rock. Romo finished second in touchdowns and third in yards, yards per game, and QBR.

It was the best season for the Cowboys in over a decade, as they won 13 games while capturing the No. 1 seed in the NFC and home-field advantage. Unfortunately, they ran into a Giants team in the divisional round that they’d swept during the regular season and beaten by double digits in both games.

That playoff upset was also surrounded by controversy, as this was the year Tony Romo (with then girlfriends Jessica Simpson), Jason Witten, and others traveled to Cabo San Lucas during the playoff bye week they’d earned. Whether it truly had anything to do with the team coming out flat against the Giants will never be known, but they sure got their share of criticism for the timing of their vacation.

So, Ben Simmons can still ball out when he wants to.

Saying Simmons’ return to the court after over a year off had been a slow burn would be the understatement of the decade. Rumors were already circulating about the Nets not being happy with Ben’s progress, and we’re barely a month into the season. Simmons has already missed five games in the first month of the season.

Over his first nine games played, Simmons had zero games where he scored in double figures. But something may have finally clicked with Simmons, as he’s hit double figures now in three consecutive games. Simmons even shot over 70 percent from the field in each game, and Brooklyn won two of the three. On Sunday, against Memphis, the former All-Star scored a season-high 22 points on 11 of 13 shooting.

It may not seem like much, but considering where we were with Simmons a week ago, this improvement is groundbreaking. Simmons has built a reputation as a guy who is afraid to shoot, and it feels like it happened overnight. Going back to Philly, he’s never been a good jump shooter, but at least he would choose his spots earlier in his career. Toward the end of his tenure with the 76ers, he’d pass up open layups.

Simmons seems to have shaken whatever had overcome him with his performance in the last three games, whether it was a mental block or something else. The biggest mental test for Simmons is still in front of — he’ll return to Philly for the first time in a Nets uniform on Tuesday night. Simmons is smart enough to know what he’s in for when he takes the court in Philadelphia.

A solid showing against his former teammates in front of that rowdy Philly fan base would go a long way in rebuilding Ben’s confidence. With all the off-court distractions in Brooklyn from Kyrie Irving, Kevin Durant, and even Simmons in his brief time with the team, this group could use some positivity.

If Simmons has indeed turned the corner, it couldn’t have come at a better time. With Irving making his return from an eight-game suspension, the Nets are now one game under .500, sitting in ninth place in the eastern conference. It’s not even December yet, so there’s more than enough time for this team to make a run if they can get everybody on the same page.

I still don’t view them as a championship team, but with Simmons getting back to his former self (if he continues at this rate), Durant, Irving, and a supporting cast that features shooters like Seth Curry and Joe Harris, Brooklyn could surprise some teams later this season.

After eight years you forget what it’s like in the deep end of the pool, and all the things you imagined since the USMNT qualified actually play out on the field. And the feeling that you could kiss anyone in front of you swinging wildly to being able to take a human life in an instant. No one watches sports to have fun. What’s fun? Fuck you if you want to have fun. It’s about feeling everything else, so rarely any of it good. Anyway, let’s break down the doings of the first full day of the 2022 World Cup.

Game of the day – Wales 1, USA 1

We’ll have a deep dive of this one directly, but it was just about the only interesting game of the day, unless you’re English. The US got the exact opening 45 minutes it wanted. The problem is that FIFA still requires a team to play 90 minutes, though you never know how that might change in the future (see what happens if by some miracle Qatar is leading or tied in a game at the 70 minute mark, but more on this also in a second). Wales hurled themselves at the US in the second half, though not with any particular direction, but it all paid off with a penalty after a woefully stupid challenge from Walker Zimmerman on Gareth Bale to allow the latter to tee up from the spot, just about the only time anyone noticed him all match. The last 20 minutes, thanks to the new policy of letting injury time be decided by a cokehead in this tournament, were frantic and structureless, but neither team had anything left to conjure up a winner.

Other results: England 6-2 Iran

It couldn’t have gone much better for England, who spent about half an hour playing with their food before letting Jude Bellingham, soon to be the most expensive midfielder in history, off the leash to open the scoring. Once they got the lead, Iran didn’t have a plan for going forward and seemed to give up on defending as well, and the Three Lions ran rampant. Either Harry Kane or Bellingham or Declan Rice were able to ping passes out to their wide forwards, be it Bukayo Saka, Raheem Sterling, Marcus Rashford, or Jack Grealish, as Iran simply never got close to them. Once those guys are in space, you can forget it. England contrived to give away two goals, probably out of pure boredom, but they stretched and bent and broke the Iranian defense in whatever way they pleased.

Netherlands 2-0 Senegal

The fear was that Senegal without Sadio Mane would be an absolute bore, and so it came to pass against The Netherlands. The Dutch didn’t look too spicy either, struggling to get through a pretty stout Sengal midfield and only creating the sporadic chance. It’s been a tournament full of abstract goalkeeping, and Éduoard Mendy was only too happy to pick up the torch from Saad Al Sheeb of Qatar, chasing a butterfly when there was a cross to deal with that he wasn’t within five feet of:

Mendy wasn’t done, as he spooned out a rebound to Davy Klassen after nothing more than a suggestion of a shot from Memphis Depay. Senegal didn’t deserve much, given how little they created, but they might have seen things out to grab a point had their keeper not transported to Strawberry Fields for the second half.

Goal of the day

Tim Weah’s was a gorgeous finish off an elegant counter from the US, but gotta give it to Saka’s hammertime of a volley:

You’d like more than dentist-waiting-room-passion from the Iran defense there to get out to Saka, but can’t argue with what he came up with.

Did VAR fuck anything up?

No, they left that to Qatar and FIFA.

Did Qatar or FIFA fuck anything up?

And how! The day started with FIFA decreeing that the teams that had planned to have their captains wear “One Love” armbands were now not allowed to do so, and any captain who went against the rules would be yellow carded on the spot. The seven FAs planning to do so backed off.

While it sounds truly weak that the pretty much empty gesture of wearing an armband proved too much when threatened with on-field penalties, it’s important to remember how many layers this kind of protest had to filter down through to then be up to the players.

It was FIFA who put this tournament in the land of intolerance. It was then up to any member of FIFA to band together to stop it, except they were too busy counting their non-sequential bills. Perhaps any collection of actual governments could have stepped up, but they need oil and natural gas too much. There’s probably a couple more levels that could have done something before players were asked to be the ones to be symbols of defiance in what turned out to be kind of an unworkable gesture now.

And again, this was right on the cusp of when England’s Harry Kane was going to be the first to wear one. Was this something sent down the chain from the Qatari rulers? Did FIFA just anticipate this is what they’d say anyway? Did they do it out of fear? We knew the beer ban in stadiums on the eve of the tournament could mushroom into bigger stuff, and here we are.

That would be bad enough, but Grant Wahl had a tale to tell before the USMNT match:

It feels like that someone told stadium security that Wahl might be the preeminent soccer journalist in this country and giving him a bullhorn to loudly display the horseshit way the government wants to run wouldn’t be the best idea, though it’s too late now. Putting the idea of “sportswashing” even more into the farce.

Were we done? Nope! Their ticket app failed before the England match, leaving swaths of fans stuck outside the stadium when England were kicking off.

Also, FIFA declared that the Netherlands-Senegal match had 3,000 more fans than the stated capacity of the stadium. You tell us:

And to keep going, Iran fans who wanted to bring in Persian flags, a symbol of the protests going on in that country, had them confiscated. This tournament is going well!

Did Alexi Lalas say anything dumb?

“MLS Cup champion Gareth Bale.” Just stare at it, marvel at its beauty…

The “He’s Over Here” award

Ismaila Sarr provided one of the few moments of Senegalese verve, causing Denzel Dumphries to end up in the axed out beer booths on the concourse.

You get injury time! And you get injury time! And you get injury time!

There’s always been a school of thought that 10 or 12 minutes of injury time should be a regular occurrence, given how little time the ball can spend in play in soccer. Apparently, FIFA has decided to try and market correct this in one tournament. England and Iran played 117 minutes, though there were serious injuries to account for. Senegal and the Netherlands played 102. The US and Wales had 10 minutes of injury time to wade through in the second half. This is going to get silly later in the tournament, just you watch.