Former NBA centre Andrew Bogut believes Ben Simmons’ current standoff with the Philadelphia 76ers is nothing more than a game of brinkmanship between the two parties.
Simmons was booted from Sixers practice by coach Doc Rivers on Wednesday and was fined $1.4m USD for missing four recent pre-season games, with teammate Joel Embiid criticising him publicly in the ugly aftermath of the incident.
Bogut said the current situation didn’t help either Simmons or the franchise itself, saying both the player and team were at a “line in the sand” moment after the latest ugly episode.
“Ugly. It’s not pretty,” Bogut said on SEN Drive.
“It’s not good for either party, training with a phone in your pocket and not being glued into what’s going on … my theory is he’s shown up technically so he had to be paid and if he does the bare minimum and they do ask him to leave the team, he gets his full pay. This could be a bit of a chess game.
“If he gets moved on, this will be forgotten about in a couple of months but the problem is, it’s a line in the sand right now.
“His trade value goes down which hurts Philadelphia … it’s going to be interesting to see how this plays out. I can’t see Philly continuing to hold the line and fining him. It’s messy for both sides and doesn’t help his brand.
“There isn’t going to be much sympathy for Ben as he does have form in this as we saw with the national team, there isn’t going to be too much sympathy for his end.
“Hopefully they can sort it out and both sides can have something positive come out of it.”
The 76ers begin their NBA campaign against the New Orleans Pelicans on Thursday morning (AEDT).