Ben Simmons’ athletic journey just got weirder.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Simmons has already traveled an odd basketball path. He was a top recruit, a star at LSU, a No. 1 overall pick, a young standout for the 76ers<\/a> and then all of a sudden a declining player who didn’t shoot and lost playing time in the NBA year after year.<\/p>\n After all that, though, this next Simmons twist is the most surprising.<\/p>\n Simmons is dipping his toes into the waters of professional fishing.<\/p>\n NBA writer Marc Spears shared<\/a> in a new story that Simmons is the new controlling operator of the South Florida Sails in the Sport Fishing Championship.<\/p>\n \u201cThe way I see it, it\u2019s like the new F1 [Formula 1] for fishing. The new LIV Golf for fishing,\u201d Simmons told Spears. \u201cThe first real competitive sport fishing championship. It\u2019s a league of 16 teams, which is growing and expanding. And so, we\u2019ll go out there and compete in various different tournaments, and there\u2019ll be a champion crowned at the end. It\u2019s a point-scored system. So, you\u2019re fishing for white marlin, blue marlin, sailfish and striped marlin. There are all different point systems for each one.”<\/p>\n MORE:\u00a0Nikola Jokic just broke an NBA record that might end up being unbreakable<\/a><\/p>\n Simmons had more to say.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s a very niche sport,” he told Spears. “And if you don\u2019t know, you don\u2019t know. But once you experience it and get out there and see what it\u2019s about, you\u2019re kind of in awe of what the sport is. And that\u2019s just something I\u2019ve always been interested in in terms of the sport of fishing. The technique. And there\u2019s so much to it that people just don\u2019t understand. These guys are fishing on million-dollar vessels, and they\u2019re out for days at a time. So, it\u2019s tedious and gritty, but a lot of fun. It\u2019s one of those worlds where you just got to kind of experience it, get into it and see what it\u2019s about.\u201d<\/p>\n Simmons looks set to go down as a major NBA “what if?”<\/p>\n His career averages are 13.1 points, 7.4 rebounds, 7.2 assists and 1.5 steals between the 76ers, Nets<\/a> and Clippers<\/a>, but at one point it seemed like he could be so much more.<\/p>\n Simmons played 18 games with the Clippers to end last season. He was an unrestricted free agent, and he hasn’t yet signed with a team.<\/p>\n Simmons dealt with back injuries at the end of last season, and he’s looking for the right chance.<\/p>\n \u201cI don\u2019t believe it\u2019s just [about] getting on a team,\u201d Simmons told Spears. \u201cSo, if I were to play right now, I think I\u2019d fit right into the NBA just given what I can do. But I want to give everything I can to the game. I don\u2019t think there\u2019s any point in just wasting a spot just to be out there. I think that\u2019s a little selfish. And there are guys that do it now. But that\u2019s what it is, the business. For me, I\u2019m very blessed to not have to be in that situation where I need to fight right now. But I want to get to the best of my ability and physical peak to compete. Otherwise, it doesn\u2019t really serve me any purpose.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n Also, believe it or not, Simmons is still just 29 years old.<\/p>\n His sports life has a long way to go, and this chapter now includes fishing.<\/p>\n More NBA news:<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ben Simmons’ athletic journey just got weirder.\u00a0 Simmons has already traveled an odd basketball path. He was a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":364426,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[434],"tags":[49,48,459,82],"class_list":["post-364425","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nba","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-nba","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/364425","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=364425"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/364425\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/364426"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=364425"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=364425"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=364425"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}