The player will now be missing a second NBA season in a row as he faces another medical procedure.
The latest reports about NBA player, Joel Embiid, are that he will be missing another season as a Philadelphia 76ers, because he will be headed toward another surgery on his injured right foot, and insurance coverage may not be helping the team to recoup its losses.
NBA contracts provide a full guarantee to players whose injuries cause them to be sidelined.
That said, teams can often look to their insurance coverage to be able to recoup some of the associated expenses from those sidelined players. That said, according to Darren Rovell from ESPN, this will likely not be the case with Embiid. He reported that “The $9 million the Philadelphia 76ers ownership will pay Joel Embiid in his first two years, even though he has not played an NBA game, will come out of their pockets.”
Even though Embiid’s contract has insurance coverage, this injury has been excluded from the policy.
Rovell explained that the contract was covered under an insurance policy – especially because Embiid’s salary is within the top 5 on the team. However, because the player’s right foot is considered to be a pre-existing injury, the policy has excluded it. He said that “Embiid first had surgery on the foot the week before the 2014 NBA draft, in which he was taken by the 76ers with the third pick.”
This likely hasn’t come as any sort of surprise to the team, since they were well aware of this pre-existing injury at the time that Embiid was drafted. They were also aware of the extent of the insurance policy and knew that if Embiid experienced another injury or needed further treatment for the foot, they would need to pay for his salary, themselves.
What is curious about this insurance coverage is that Embiid does actually have a personal insurance policy that was first taken out back when he was still at Kansas. That policy protects him to the point that he should – unlikely as it may sound – choose to step out of basketball altogether before the close of November, he will receive a tax-free payout of $5 million. Equally, should the injuries continue to stop him from being able to play a total of at least 20 million throughout the length of his pro-ball career, he will also be able to claim.
