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Tim Bontemps, ESPN
The NBA announced Thursday that it had fined the Philadelphia 76ers $75,000 and New Orleans Pelicans $25,000 for violations of the league’s injury reporting rules.
Philadelphia was fined after Joel Embiid went from not being on the injury report to “out with left knee soreness” for a nationally televised game Saturday afternoon in Denver against Nikola Jokic and the Nuggets.
New Orleans was fined for doing the same with Trey Murphy for Saturday’s game against the Milwaukee Bucks.
Embiid appeared to injure the knee — one that has bothered him throughout the season — in Thursday’s loss to the Indiana Pacers, but wasn’t listed on the injury report before the team sat him Saturday after not liking how he looked in warmups.
The league’s reigning Most Valuable Player also missed Monday’s game in Portland before returning to the court Tuesday against the Golden State Warriors — a game he exited in the fourth quarter after Jonathan Kuminga fell on his leg. Embiid is out for Thursday night’s game in Utah, but the team hasn’t said how much longer he’ll be out.
Murphy, meanwhile, hasn’t played in a single back-to-back this season after offseason knee surgery, but he wasn’t listed on the injury report for the second night of a back-to-back against Milwaukee that he ultimately did not play in.
Philadelphia received a significantly higher fine because of prior violations of this policy, though the league said that Embiid’s injury was a confirmed existing one — meaning the 76ers were not in violation of the newly instituted player participation policy.
The NBA fined the Brooklyn Nets $100,000 for being in violation of the PPP last month — the only time this season a team has been fined for violating the new rule.