Joel Embiid has turned up to Philadelphia’s training camp noticeably lighter, and Ramona Shelburne tied the transformation directly to the biggest name in the room.
“I’ve been hearing Embiid’s getting to the gym early, he’s down to his rookie weight, this is a new Joel,” Shelburne said.
The 76ers listed Embiid at 250 pounds when they drafted him third overall out of Kansas in 2014. His current NBA profile puts him at 270 pounds, and reporting on his offseason places him close to the rookie figure after a summer spent on training rather than rehab.
‘The approval of the GOAT’
The context is LeBron James, who signed a two-year, $8 million deal with Philadelphia in free agency after turning down retirement. The four-time champion joined a core already built around Embiid, Tyrese Maxey and newly acquired All-Star Jaylen Brown.
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Shelburne described a culture shift already moving through the locker room.
“Everybody’s trying to earn LeBron’s approval and respect,” she said.
“I saw this in LA in 2020 when AD was trying to impress him and played every game. Everybody wants the approval of the GOAT.”
The Davis parallel from the 2020 Lakers
Anthony Davis, who partnered with James on the Lakers from 2019, played 62 regular-season games in that first year together. The pair won the championship in the Orlando bubble.
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Davis is no longer in Los Angeles, and the comparison Shelburne drew was behavioural, not roster-based: a star adjusting his habits around James’s standard.
A healthy summer after two broken seasons
Embiid’s conditioning has sat at the centre of every Sixers forecast for three years. He played 38 games in 2025-26 and only 19 the year before, with his last campaign ending in an April appendectomy on top of knee issues that had required arthroscopic surgery.
“It’s the first summer he’s actually been healthy,” LeBron’s agent Rich Paul said on the Game Over podcast in July. “Not having some type of surgery over the summer, which is always good.”
Embiid sat out the preseason opener
Philadelphia opened its preseason on Monday, 5 October, against the defending-champion New York Knicks. Embiid sat the game out under a cautious workload plan.
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The 76ers open their regular season at Madison Square Garden on Tuesday, 20 October, with tip-off at 7pm local time.
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