PHILADELPHIA – Joel Embiid heard the chant, immediately became intoxicated by the sound, but never lost focus. But after making the first of two free throws, Embiid stepped away from the foul line, raised his hands like an orchestra conductor and begged Philadelphia 76ers fans to keep serenading him with that lovely lullaby: “Trust the process! Trust the process!”

Embiid hasn’t brought back the wins – he’ll eventually need some help from injured No. 1 overall pick Ben Simmons for that – but he has provided hope. And, the packed arena on hand to watch him tangle with Minnesota Timberwolves second-year big man Karl-Anthony Towns last Tuesday supported his status as a burgeoning box office draw. A 7-footer with power to punish teams inside, the range to hit the occasional 3-pointer, the athleticism to track down LeBron James for a chase-down block and the personality to turn his social media accounts into a charming comedy routine, Embiid has made the two-year wait for his arrival worthwhile after spending much of his time since being drafted third overall in 2014 recovering from recurring foot problems.

He’s all but wrapped up Rookie of the Year honors before the season has reached the halfway mark despite playing on a minutes restriction. He’s made Shirley Temples cool again. And, he earned the respect of Sacramento Kings All-Star center DeMarcus Cousins with a recent butt-slapping love fest that concluded with Cousins declaring that Embiid could one day be the best big man in the league “after I retire.”

Still flattered by the compliment, Embiid explained this week why he quickly rebutted Cousins’ comment by stating that he wouldn’t have to wait that long to be considered the best at his position. “I started playing basketball in 2011 and I missed two and a half of those years, so I’ve got a lot to learn and I’m still learning,” Embiid, 22, told The Vertical. “This is my first year playing. I’m a rookie. People always say I’m a quick learner, so that’s why I say I probably won’t have to wait until [Cousins] retires.”

Embiid’s quest to be the best won’t be easy because he will face competition almost every step of the way, thanks to a generation of special big men who won’t let him have the title by default. Towns got the better of Embiid in their first matchup on Nov. 17. The Timberwolves won 110-86, and Towns embarrassed Embiid by pump-faking and driving around him for an emphatic slam. Embiid immediately marked the rematch on his calendar, determined for payback, which he received with a 93-91 victory. After the game, Embiid was disappointed that he wouldn’t see Towns again.

“You know, one thing since I started playing basketball, one thing I’ve always liked, is that somebody kicked my butt. For me, that’s how I learn,” Embiid told The Vertical. “If you go at me and kick my butt, you know that the next time, I’m going to get you. Since high school, I’ve always been that way. People have always kicked my ass, so I try to figure out what I should do better and what I should work on. That’s what I love. You make a mistake the first time and then the second time around, you change and be a better player.”

“Put the center back on the All-Star ballot”

Embiid has been the long-awaited reward of the 76ers’ grueling, eyesore of a rebuilding process that began with since-fired general manager Sam Hinkie. But Embiid’s introduction to the NBA has coincided with an influx of potentially dominant centers who might eventually rule the league again. So, while his ultimate objective is to first return Philadelphia to respectability, Embiid feels another responsibility that might one day help him make an All-Star team – and impress an unnamed “crush” who may or may not be pop star Rihanna: He’d like to see the center position returned to the All-Star ballot.

“I feel like they should put the centers back. We’ve got a lot of talent,” Embiid told The Vertical. “There’s a lot of talented centers in the league. That’s on [the NBA] to do that. But my job here is to keep playing basketball and be the best I can be and push them to make that decision to put the center back on the All-Star ballot.”

Believing that the centers had moved beyond the dinosaur phase and into something closer to fossil fuel, the NBA removed the position for the 2013 All-Star ballot, lumping it in with three frontcourt spots. Stu Jackson, then the NBA’s vice president of basketball operations, told NBA.com at the time that the move was made because of “the way our game has evolved.”

The change spared fans from being forced to select less-deserving players from a seemingly unimpactful position. But the move created some oddities, such as James and Kobe Bryant jumping for the opening tip in last year’s All-Star Game in Toronto. And, it is now looking like a premature move, occurring during Anthony Davis’ rookie season with more talented big men arriving on the scene.

Point guards have owned much of this pick-and-roll, bomb-unconsciously-from-3 era, but most of the NBA’s promising, rising talent is of the 6-foot-11-and-taller variety. Embiid, Towns, Davis, Kristaps Porzingis, Myles Turner and Nikola Jokic are all age 23 or younger and helping to bring centers out from hibernation and back to the forefront with a twist. As the game has evolved, so have the most skilled giants, who can now nimbly run the floor, defend multiple positions and have range that extends beyond the low block and into long distance.

“I knew it had to come back,” Atlanta Hawks center Dwight Howard recently told The Vertical. “You need those bigs as much as the game is changing. Guys are shooting threes, stuff like that. You still need to have that dominating presence. The game always comes back to where it should be.”

Birth of the stretch fives

Centers are also coming in different variations, such as the defensive-minded, rebounders and shot-blockers such as Rudy Gobert, DeAndre Jordan, Andre Drummond and Hassan Whiteside. But even more established low-post big men such as Cousins, Brook Lopez and Marc Gasol are diversifying their games and attempting – and making – more 3-pointers. Stepping out further from the basket previously would’ve been considered a waste of size but is now almost a necessity. Rasheed Wallace felt that expanding his range helped extend his career because it spared him from the constant pounding in the low post, but the league now has a demand for skilled players at every position. Cousins attempted 69 3-pointers in his first five seasons, but after taking 210 last season, he already has 161 in 34 games. Why the dramatic increase?

“Because I can shoot it,” Cousins said, matter-of-factly.

Compared to his counterparts, Cousins’ progression seems pedestrian. Gasol has taken 124 of his 190 career 3-point attempts in 36 games this season. Lopez has taken 159 of his 190 career attempts in just 30 games. The term “stretch five” is suddenly becoming a thing, and Cousins has a simple explanation for that as well. “Because they want to be like me,” Cousins said with a grin.

Analytics have supported the league-wide push to take more 3-pointers and that has forced big men to either adjust or get left behind. The young generation of centers grew up watching Shaquille O’Neal’s power game and Tim Duncan’s methodical bank shots, but they were also shaped by 7-footers like the versatile Kevin Garnett, the sharpshooting Dirk Nowitzki, and even more recently Kevin Durant, who only recently admitted to being taller than his listed 6-9. Being big no longer means being stapled to the post.

“When I was coming up, in junior high, high school, we were taught to stay in the paint, shooting in the paint,” Indiana Pacers reserve Al Jefferson, a throwback from a bygone era, told The Vertical. “Now you’ve got these big men [who are] very talented with the ball, who can handle like guards, who shoot the ball. You’ve got to take your hat off to them, because this younger generation is coming up more talented, able to do more stuff, and changing the game.”

Jefferson marveled at the development of Turner, his 20-year-old teammate, a ranging 7-footer who has already recorded a game this season with four 3-pointers and four blocked shots. “That’s something I’ve done my whole life,” Turner told The Vertical. “Being able to shoot, being able to handle the ball and do everything, so I feel like I’m fitting right in with the way the league is transitioning. I just play my game. I take what the defense gives me. It doesn’t have to be shooting threes. It doesn’t have to be out there in the post. It’s whatever it is.”

Towns, the Minnesota Timberwolves’ reigning Rookie of the Year, believes his exposure to multifaceted big men meant he didn’t have to settle on playing one way. An obvious student of the game, Towns lists several players – former teammate Garnett, Duncan, Hakeem Olajuwon, Sam Perkins, Len Bias and even Magic Johnson – as influences on a style that routinely finds him putting the ball on the floor, driving and stepping out to the 3-point line. “I can name more and more, but you want to take those flavors but also add your own spice and secret ingredients to yourself to make it different,” Towns told The Vertical. “I just try to play the game the way I want to play. I have a lot of flavors from a lot of players throughout history.”

Davis’ versatility can be attributed to the incredible growth spurt before his junior season in high school that took him from unheralded guard to highly recruited big man. Turner sprouted from 6-4 to 6-9 during his freshman year in high school but his father, David, made sure that he continued to do ball-handling drills with the guards while learning how to remain composed in the paint.

“The way I look at it, we’re all just basketball players,” Turner told The Vertical. “It’s kind of refreshing to see that I’m coming into an age where you’re a basketball player, you’re not just a primary position. It’s very interesting to see what some of the other guys are doing and it’s exciting … I kind of think we should redefine that position.”

Embiid started playing so much later in life but was immediately drawn to Olajuwon, a fellow native of the African continent. He worked hard to mimic Olajuwon’s legendary post moves, such as a dazzling Dream Shake he unveiled in his first regular-season game. But the injuries of the past two seasons limited Embiid to mostly stand-still form shooting, which helped him develop a stroke that has yielded staggering results: In his first 23 games, Embiid actually made more 3-pointers than Stephen Curry (27 to 26).

“I want to be a complete player. I want to play like a guard. So that time [recovering] really helped me and now it’s kind of paying off,” Embiid told The Vertical. “First and foremost, I want to be a post player and I want to dominate on the block. And whenever I’m open and I can shoot a 3, I can do that, but I want to be a dominant low-post player.”

The defensive challenge for big men

Porzingis is still listed at power forward, but the New York Knicks have been more effective with lineups in which the 7-3 big man – whom Durant dubbed “a unicorn” because of his unique skill set – is playing a rim-protecting center. As he continues to add bulk, Porzingis will likely move up one position. Even still, the challenge of playing defense has gotten much greater for big men because they have to be mobile enough to run out to the perimeter and strong enough to not surrender much ground inside.

“I take pride in defense,” Embiid told The Vertical. “I want to be a multiple time Defensive Player of the Year, so I love it, especially when you switch on guards. I love switching on them and locking them down. I take pride in stopping the other guy.”

Towns doesn’t always defend opposing centers, with teammate Gorgui Dieng usually taking on that assignment. But in the final minutes of his last meeting with Embiid, Towns asked Timberwolves coach Tom Thibodeau for the opportunity to guard Embiid as the two engaged in an intense, sometimes chippy duel. Embiid got the win, but Towns had an impressive late block, pinning a shot against the glass. “It’s part of my game. That’s what my game is all built off, versatility and being a hybrid, so for me, it’s about keeping up with them by doing the same thing I do, running around, staying with them,” Towns told The Vertical. “I’ve been blessed. I trained all offseason to make sure I can be the best player I can be.”

Those lacking the ability to stretch the floor or defend outside of the paint have been relegated to reserve roles – a fate that has already claimed Embiid’s teammate, Jahlil Okafor, and other young big men such as Nikola Vucevic and even Jefferson in his advancing age. Turner calls Jefferson “the last of a dying breed.” Had he come up 10 years later, Jefferson believes that he’d still be a physical, back-to-basket low post player – a skill set that he feels continues to have value even in a modern game.

“Teams don’t know how to double-team [anymore],” Jefferson told The Vertical. “The game plan is not to double-team, so it messes up the whole flow to the game. It kind of helps, it works for me. That’s what makes me good.”

The next phase

Howard and Jefferson both entered a much more physical league with “hand-to-hand combat” down low. Howard had to take his lumps and dole out a few elbows of his own with the likes of O’Neal, Duncan, Ben Wallace, Rasheed Wallace and Alonzo Mourning. “Now it’s guys who don’t even come in the paint,” Howard told The Vertical. “It’s crazy to see the transition. I’m pretty sure in my 20th season the game will be a little bit different. They might have a 4-point line by then.”

Towns feels fortunate to be part of a game-changing movement for a position that once appeared to be near extinction. “I just think that people’s perspective of the way the bigs roamed the world in the NBA years ago has changed, and that’s why I feel people said the big man is dead,” Towns told The Vertical. “It’s not dead, it’s just changed as time went on. I don’t know. It’s so many bigs now that can do so many things. I think right now we just have to step back and wait and see how it changes with us.”

Embiid already knows where he expects the game – and this process – to take him. “By the end of my career,” Embiid said, “I want to be a point guard.”

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