I know some people may roll their eyes reading this since he's a Sixers player now. But I have to imagine Horford has some lingering injury and he's playing hurt. I mean, I can't imagine his entire game just died in one offseason.
Yes, he doesn't seem to fit well there to begin with and is simply "Embiid insurance", but I think he's still a productive player that just is out of sync lately.
I will say this though. He's not the only Sixers problem. Tobias Harris seems to disappear against great teams a lot and tonight was another example. And he's making 180M over the next 5 years. Middleton is actually worth the similar extension he signed and he's proving it. Harris, not so much.
Horford was already on the decline when he was with the Celts.
I'm not surprised that this is happening to Horford.
He wasn't really at all. His best year ever in terms of efficiency, his second best in terms of total rebound %, best in terms of shot-blocking percentage, and his best scoring per-minute year as a Celtic. He just played less because we had 10 guys routinely getting 15+ MPG, two of them being Baynes and Theis.
Celts were paying Horford 28m per year.
His production with the Celts does not justify the contract he got.
Even when Horford was just averaging 30.5 minutes per game with the Hawks, in 2014-15, Horford still managed to average 15.2 ppg.
With the Celts, Horford's best was 14.0 ppg.
Horford was a max player signing in the summer of 2016.
He didn't play like a max player in his 3 seasons with the Cs.
Ah, the good old nonsense about PPG determining whether or not a player is worth a max contract. Rudy Gobert has never averaged over 16PPG - is he not worth his contract?
Just compare the achievements of Gobert and Horford.
Here:
Gobert
NBA All-Star (2020)
2× NBA Defensive Player of the Year (2018, 2019)
All-NBA Second Team (2017)
All-NBA Third Team (2019)
3× NBA All-Defensive First Team (2017–2019)
NBA blocks leader (2017)
French Player of the Year (2019)
Horford
5× NBA All-Star (2010, 2011, 2015, 2016, 2018)
All-NBA Third Team (2011)
NBA All-Defensive Second Team (2018)
NBA All-Rookie First Team (2008)
2× NCAA champion (2006, 2007)
Second-team All-American – NABC (2007)
Third-team All-American – AP (2007)
SEC Tournament MVP (2007)
The Jazz gave Gobert 102m for 4 years because Gobert is like a Mutombo.
The Celts were forced to give Horford 28m per year because they also wanted to sign KD that summer.
Would the Celts have given Horford that much money if they knew in advance that KD would go to GSW?
Also look at the stats of Gobert and Horford after they signed huge contracts in the summer of 2016.
Gobert has had better numbers than Horford since 2016-17.
And Gobert got 25.5m per year compared to Horford's 28.25m per year.