They say the only things in life that certain are death and taxes. Apparently a new certainty in life is Magic Johnson tampering in the NBA. Before the Sixers wiped the floor with the Lakers on Sunday Magic Johnson addressed the media and said Ben Simmons reached out to the Lakers about Magic working with Ben in the summer. Well needless to say people lost their damn minds. There are two schools of thought here. First you have the millennial do gooders who applaud Ben for wanting to better his game. That would be the wrong school of thought. The correct school, which I happen to be a part of, is the school of cynicism. Under no circumstances should the Sixers allow Ben Simmons to be anywhere near Magic Johnson in the off season.
Perhaps Simmons did reach out first, but Magic has no squeaky clean reputation when it comes to luring players to LA who are already under contract. Earlier this season the NBA fined the Lakers for tampering with Anthony Davis who requested a trade from New Orleans. I have no doubt in my mind that if Magic gets even five minutes alone with Simmons he will begin his greasy sales pitch. This summer Simmons will likely sign his rookie max deal that will lock him up in Philly ’til 2024. In today’s NBA I don’t trust a damn soul including Simmons. These star players try to run the show far too often and dictate to their teams what happens to them. I’m not about that shit. What ever happened to the days when a player signs a deal and he rides it out for better or worse? The NBA really is the inmates running the asylum. Which brings me back to the Simmons and Magic saga. Everyone knows Ben wanted to go to LA out of the draft but the Sixers scored the number one pick. Add that with Simmons spending his summers on the left coast and him dating smoke show Kendall Jenner, the hottest of the Kardashian clan, the Sixers couldn’t afford Magic spewing more pro LA bullshit.
Big balled GM Elton Brand said today in an interview that he shut down the Lakers request for Ben and Magic to get together. Elton is far too savvy to allow anything like that happen. If Ben wants to go out and meet with hall of famers and learn from them then by all means go for it. Just not Magic Johnson. The damn NBA shouldn’t even allow a current executive to be around a player from a different team, it should be illegal to even ask. I wouldn’t even want the workouts to happen if Brand himself was in attendance for them. Allowing Ben to gain any sort of relationship with the man who runs the show for the most sought after teams in NBA history would be negligent by the Sixers.
I’m getting pretty damn tired of Magic Johnson anyway. When has there ever been a team executive hanging out courtside before a game shooting the shit with celebrities. The Wells Fargo Center isn’t his playground to run around and play with his friends. Keep you ass up in the box with the rest of the brain trusts. I get it, he’s Magic Johnson, but the people of Philadelphia don’t give a rat’s ass about who he is and don’t need to see him.
I wasn’t born in the 80’s so I wasn’t around to see the big rivalries the Sixers had with the Lakers and Celtics. In the last year and a half though I have developed a deep rooted hatred for both of those elitist franchises. The Celtics are gearing up for an ass kicking tonight just like the Lakers got Sunday. Magic Johnson, Rob Pelinka (fake ass Rob Lowe look alike), LeBron James and pretty much anyone else who rocks the purple and gold can go to hell. Ben is ours, so suck it.