Mike Sielski: LeBron James believed he could win with Joel Embiid. The 2024 Olympics can show the Sixers how

On a practice court in Paris early in the 2024 Summer Olympics, during the event that was supposedly a testament to his selfishness and opportunism, Joel Embiid glanced around the gym at the stars who soon enough would meet their expectations of gold-medal glory. There was Steph Curry. There was Kevin Durant. There was You Know Who. There was LeBron James. "This is a great setting for me because I'm playing with a lot of great players," Embiid said then. "It's all about finding ways to win. Whatever I can add to make sure we win, that's all there is." Two years later, with James' decision last week to become Embiid's teammate again, Embiid's up-and-down experience during those Games should take on a new perspective and value. If the sacrifice of Embiid's playing in those Olympics, dragging his body up and down the court for five games in that tournament, was a lost Sixers season in 2024-25, maybe the real upshot is that the entire experience and Team USA's victory paved the way for James to stun everyone and sign with the 76ers. Only Embiid and James know how many text messages it took, how much pleading Embiid had to do to persuade James that Philadelphia was the place for him, that Embiid was healthy enough and committed enough for the two of them to win a title here. Whatever words and memes passed between them this offseason, they were enough that a source with knowledge of their interaction said that Embiid played "a significant role" in coaxing James to choose the Sixers. He wasn't the only one. Bob Myers brought the necessary cachet and credibility, and Mike Gansey's relationship with James from their time together in Cleveland helped, and Tyrese Maxey's talent and connection to James through Klutch Sports mattered. Still, this was mostly a peer-led push from Embiid and Maxey to get James to see the possibilities here. Most importantly for the Sixers and the player who has been their centerpiece for the last 12 years, Embiid already had to have established a baseline of confidence with James for LeBron to take this leap. They've been in the NBA together since 2014, but when Embiid finally settled on playing for Team USA in '24 — after shopping his skills to France and Cameroon — his relationship with James could have fallen apart. And from an outsider's view, it had the potential to crumble. It was a chore just to watch Embiid lumber around the floor, his left knee leaving his whole body wobbly and unstable, the sweat flooding his face. The complaints that Embiid had put his own aims and goals — "It feels good to be part of winning something as a team," he said after Team USA's victory over France in the gold-medal game — above the good of the Sixers were to be expected around here. They also ignored the priority that Embiid's Team USA teammates, James among them, placed on competing on that stage, for the right to call themselves the best in the world. In that context, there was an understanding that it took a lot for Embiid just to be out there playing, and there was an appreciation that, without him and his 19 points and second-half dominance of Nikola Jokić in the semifinals against Serbia, the U.S. wouldn't have won gold at all. No, Embiid wasn't the overall force that James or Curry or Durant was in Paris, but he apparently didn't do anything to dissuade James from thinking that he could win with him. Now Embiid gets another shot to witness what James does each day to prepare, how much that preparation matters to him, and how he can model the habits and behavior on which James has built his remarkable 24-year pro career. "Even though I see a broken-down Joel — in the fourth quarter, if ever the verb 'trudge' would fit anybody, Joel just trudges up the court — even given all of that, I would say it is absolutely true it's good to [be] around these guys who have won something — just getting a different kind of culture," former Sports Illustrated staff writer Jack McCallum, the author of "Dream Team," the definitive work on the 1992 U.S. Olympic men's basketball team, said in a 2024 interview. "What those guys got from the other guys. I was sort of astonished to hear that. … 'Oh, I really found out how Karl Malone worked out. Oh, I really found out about Larry Bird's shooting drills. Oh, I watched [Michael] Jordan and [Scottie] Pippen play defense, and I took that back to my team.' As much as [the Sixers] are probably going, 'No,' I would say play, because I think there's a real positive aspect that he can get out of that." The time to show what he learned is now. At 32, without having appeared in more than 39 games in any regular season since 2022-23, Embiid can't be counted on and shouldn't expect to be the primary focus of the offense every single time he's in the lineup. The best-case scenario for the Sixers, of course, is that he won't have to be — not every night, not even most nights. Among James, Brown, Maxey, VJ Edgecombe and an improved bench, they have plenty of firepower even if Embiid isn't their alpha and omega. "You're used to being the guy," he said in Paris. "Now you've got to be with these guys." What they'll likely need is what he gave Team USA against Serbia. What they'll need is Embiid to pick his spots, to win them particular games against particular opponents. He'll still be vital, but he might end up bearing a lesser burden, and the team might be better for it. "There's a certain amount of relief that comes with not having to bear the full responsibility of the franchise," Steve Kerr, who was Team USA's head coach in Paris, said at the time. "These guys get to lean on each other. Every game is different. They get to throw all the other nonsense out the window because none of it matters. The only thing that matters is winning the gold medal." The same standard applies here and now for James and Embiid, for the Sixers, for a city waiting 43 years and counting for its latest NBA championship. Embiid's performance in those Olympics was mostly a hard watch and a distant memory until these last few days. But come next spring, if there's a celebration here unlike any since 1983, it will have been an investment worth the windfall.