76ers not paying Ben Simmons $8.25 million owed today

Shams Charania: Sources: The 76ers are not paying Ben Simmons his $8.25 million payment due today as the three-time All-Star awaits a trade. Simmons still is not showing up to Philadelphia and has understood the ramifications of his holdout.
Source: Twitter @ShamsCharania

What’s the buzz on Twitter?

Doug Smith @SmithRaps
No one ever thought the Sixers actually would pay Ben Simmons $8.25 million today, did they? – 3:03 PM

Tim Bontemps @TimBontemps
Reporting with @Brian Windhorst and @Bobby Marks: Sources confirm the 76ers have not paid Ben Simmons the $8.2 million he was owed today. The money has been put in an escrow account, & any fines accrued by him for not showing up will be deducted from that amount moving forward. – 3:01 PM

Kurt Helin @basketballtalk
Report: 76ers not paying Ben Simmons the $8,250,984 he’s due today nba.nbcsports.com/2021/10/01/rep… – 2:59 PM

Shams Charania @ShamsCharania
Sources: The 76ers are not paying Ben Simmons his $8.25 million payment due today as the three-time All-Star awaits a trade. Simmons still is not showing up to Philadelphia and has understood the ramifications of his holdout. – 2:56 PM

Noah Levick @NoahLevick
Source confirms @Jake Fischer‘s report that Sixers are withholding the 25% of Ben Simmons’ 2021-22 salary that’s due today. – 2:55 PM

Nate Duncan @NateDuncanNBA
I think Rich Paul and Ben Simmons might have flown a little too close to the sun. There are plenty of ways to maintain plausible deniability on performing your contract and get what you want, e.g. Butler, Harden. But this is just too overt a breach, makes it too easy for the team – 2:41 PM

Marc Stein @TheSteinLine
Weekend dime-dropping time, friends …
Early reviews of the new Wilson basketball, Day 5 of Ben Simmons’ holdout in Philly and much more you won’t read anywhere else … all via my latest This Week In Basketball column: marcstein.substack.com/p/new-balls-pl… – 2:30 PM

Jake Fischer @JakeLFischer
The Sixers will indeed not pay Ben Simmons the 25% of his salary due today, according to league sources. And there are now growing whispers that Simmons could respond by actually reporting to Philadelphia, albeit maintaining that he is injured: bleacherreport.com/articles/29489… – 2:21 PM

Kurt Helin @basketballtalk
Ben Simmons just latest in long list of clashes for Daryl Morey nba.nbcsports.com/2021/10/01/ben… – 1:53 PM

Lang Greene @LangGreene
The funniest part of this Ben Simmons saga is the fact that Ben acts as if the fans of his new team won’t ask him to shoot jump shots either – 1:46 PM

Ky Carlin @Ky_Carlin
Glenn “Hurricane” Schwartz is fed up with Ben Simmons pic.twitter.com/9XsIO1HY6r – 1:06 PM

Tom Moore @TomMoorePhilly
#NBA column: A look at the outcomes with percentages as to how the #Sixers‘ situation with Ben Simmons gets resolved (for subscribers): bit.ly/3kVZFiD #76ers pic.twitter.com/6kjnHlI7wy – 12:25 PM

Howard Beck @HowardBeck
New Crossover pod: The Sixers’ mess was too big to tackle with just one expert, so I got two Processologists to break it down: @Yaron Weitzman and @Jake Fischer.
How did we get here? What’s next for Ben Simmons? And What Would Hinkie Think?
Subscribe: link.chtbl.com/crossover – 11:44 AM

Marc Stein @TheSteinLine
Ben Simmons is due 25 percent of his salary ($8.25 million) today, but whether or not the Sixers issue the check on Day 5 of Ben’s holdout one source close to the process says Simmons’ camp believes it will ultimately get the money either way after a trade or separate resolution. – 10:00 AM

Tom Moore @TomMoorePhilly
#Sixers column: How will the Ben Simmons situation end up being resolved (for subscribers)? bit.ly/3kVZFiD #NBA pic.twitter.com/M8FbwJhZCb – 9:30 AM

Tom Ziller @teamziller
What struck me about Joel Embiid’s comments on Thursday was not that he was coming for Ben Simmons. It was that Embiid is showing a pretty remarkable level of equanimity in all of this. ziller.substack.com/p/in-appreciat… pic.twitter.com/4qbCFwWWyE – 9:11 AM

Tom Moore @TomMoorePhilly
#NBA column: A look at potential outcomes with percentages on how the #Sixers‘ situation with Ben Simmons ends up being resolved (for subscribers): bit.ly/3kVZFiD #76ers pic.twitter.com/oEd7jMD2oV – 6:40 AM

Rich Hoffman @rich_hofmann
Even as they’ve won a bunch of games, everyone has questioned Joel Embiid and Ben Simmons’ on-court fit. When presented with the idea that Simmons thinks Embiid is holding him back, well, Embiid didn’t hold back.
Embiid told the truth: theathletic.com/2860386/2021/0… – 7:27 PM

Mike Lynch @SportInfo247
Ben Simmons in high and very high leverage situations during his career (playoffs and reg season):
WITH JE W/O JE
Minutes 329 202
TS% 67.3 47.1
Usage 13.9 19.4 – 3:51 PM

The Jump @_Talkin_NBA
Here’s how much money Ben Simmons will lose if he doesn’t rejoin the 76ers (via @Bobby Marks)
#NBATwitter pic.twitter.com/1uSvJlOEyF – 3:08 PM

More on this storyline

Friday marked Day 5 of the Simmons holdout in Philly. It was also the due date for another advance payment — worth 25% of his $33 million salary — that Simmons was scheduled to receive before the start of the season. The Sixers have been adamant that they will not publicly discuss whether they would cut or withhold this check after Simmons received a similar payout in August. One source close to the process said Thursday that the Simmons camp is confident that the player will ultimately receive the money, either after a trade or when the standoff is eventually resolved by other means, whether or not he is paid now. -via marcstein.substack.com / October 1, 2021

The financial element is one of the key factors that makes this standoff so unique compared to previous NBA holdouts. Simmons is in Year 2 of a five-year, $177 million contract. He has already earned, according to the source, in the neighborhood of $100 million in his career when factoring in Simmons’ rookie contract, his shoe deal and endorsements and the Year 1 salary from his current contract — plus this season’s first 25 percent installment. This is not a holdout motivated by the pursuit of greater riches. Simmons has already been paid handsomely in his first five seasons and thus would appear to have the financial wherewithal to keep sitting in an attempt to force the Sixers to blink and trade him. -via marcstein.substack.com / October 1, 2021

The challenge for Simmons and his agent Rich Paul: They are up against a similarly resolute foe. Sixers president of basketball operations Daryl Morey, as we’ve been writing and saying for months, was never terribly concerned about locker-room tensions or unflattering headlines in Houston. League observers consistently describe him as more apt than most front-office executives to stomach short-term discomfort if it enhances his chances down the road of a more appetizing Simmons trade offer materializing than those currently available. -via marcstein.substack.com / October 1, 2021