Sixers teammate offers strong defense of Ben Simmons

Ben Simmons’ stock absolutely plummeted this postseason, but one of his Philadelphia 76ers teammates is simply buying the dip.

Sixers guard Seth Curry spoke this week with Jeff Skversky of WPVI in Philadelphia. During the interview, Curry gave a strong defense of Simmons.

“I love playing with Ben,” Curry said. “He made me a better player individually. He made our team better all season long. He’s still a great player. He obviously had a rough playoffs, and we know that story. The front office is gonna do whatever is best for the team, I’m sure of it. If that means Ben coming back, I hope for it and look forward to playing with him again.”

Curry was then asked if he believes that the Sixers can still win an NBA championship with Simmons.

“Absolutely, absolutely,” he replied. “We were the No. 1 seed in the league. We just gotta play better. Every individual player, including him, including myself, we gotta play better, and we can do it. I know as a team we weren’t far off this year. We had a great pathway to the Finals, didn’t take care of business. That’s on all of us individually.”

Curry just wrapped up his first year with the Sixers and had a productive season shooting the basketball while feeding off Simmons’ playmaking. But Simmons’ disappearing act in the playoffs now clouds the future of the team as they face the reality that they have yet to make it out of the second round since Simmons arrived.

Still, Curry’s vote of confidence has to be encouraging for Simmons. It is also very different from what another teammate recently said about Simmons.