At Brooklyn Nets media day, Ben Simmons sat, surrounded by TV cameras and microphones, fill lights and eager eyes, answering questions from the media. He looked uncomfortable, but exuded confidence.

“I think people forget that as a player I can play basketball when I’m healthy. I’m pretty good, right?”

Ben Simmons was pretty good, right? You would think so. I own his sweater in three different sizes. I saw him get drafted at 19, cheered for him in the stands, bought him stuffed animals and pretended to be him on the basketball court.

I remember discovering basketball in 2016, the year Simmons was drafted. I went to Gamestop and bought a copy of NBA 2K17 on a whim. To my surprise, I couldn’t stop playing. I wasn’t fascinated by the gameplay; Instead, I was fascinated by the players. I’ve spent hours scouring the game’s catalog of classic teams: the ’94 Magic, the ’04 Suns, and the ’96 Bulls. I remember coming across the ’87 Lakers and discovering Magic Johnson and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. Even as digital avatars, they were extremely cool. When I was ten years old, I was in a rare, liminal state of being. I was old enough to eagerly learn and retain information, yet young enough to search for it in a plethora of wonderfully clumsy ways. I sat in a beanbag with a bowl of cereal and a broken controller, unfolding a culture, a history and its wonders.

Soon after, I started watching the 76ers, my dad’s favorite team. They were awful, uniquely awful, and I wanted them to win So bad. There were bright spots, however; center Joel Embiid showed tremendous promise, and they had Ben Simmons, the first overall pick. He did not play that season, as he was sidelined with a broken metatarsal bone in his right foot. In 2016, he was the top prospect in the draft, and the Sixers were the worst team in the league. With the best odds of being picked first in the lottery, they won it and took Simmons – Ben Simmons! – the next Lebron James. He could pass like Pete Maravich and hit like Kobe Bryant. He was tall but lean, with broad shoulders and perfect proportions. It was by Michelangelo “David”, a physical manifestation of the ideal man. Simmons – the answer – was there all season. In a way, the anticipation made his return more exciting; it was easier to idealize.

When Simmons came back, he was great. In his four active seasons with the Sixers, he was a three-time all-star, a two-time All-NBA defenseman and the 2017 NBA Rookie of the Year. Obviously, I was a believer, a believer of sorts, and I collected his merchandise with great enthusiasm. However, he was not without flaws, especially on the field. He couldn’t shoot the basketball. Every year there were rumors about offseason training, how he finally learned to shoot. But he never did, and to some extent he never even tried. He blamed everyone – the fans, the media, the coaches – everyone but himself. Nevertheless, Philadelphia made the postseason four times with Simmons. Yet they never escaped the second round. Many blamed Simmons for this, perhaps rightly so. Like Simmons did learn how to shoot, like him did expanding his game, who knows how good the Sixers could have been?

The truth is, nothing came of it, and in 2021, Simmons requested a trade from the Sixers and refused to play, citing a lack of support within the organization. The whole thing made me sad. I had invested a lot of time, money and energy in Simmons. He symbolized something I once was, a naive curiosity I once had. In 2022, Simmons got his wish. He was gone – traded to the Nets. I was disappointed, not devastated; at that moment, Simmons made his wish clear: he wanted a fresh start, and I was older – and busier.

On the Nets, Simmons has played in 57 of a possible 162 games. In those games he looks tired – done – and ready to move on. Worse still, players don’t portray Simmons as the nicest guy either, describing him as uptight and arrogant. The kind of man who puts work aside for celebrities. As a viewer, there has always been something wrong with the way Simmons behaves – how he answers questions – he is above questions, above the viewer, above you and me. It feels like sometimes he really believes he is the ideal man – the hero I saw him as. I hope Simmons succeeds; I hope he’s healthy and an all-star, but honestly, I’ve moved on. If I’m the Giving Tree, Ben Simmons is the boy. I have given him my apples, my branches, and my trunk; I have supported, I have cheered and idolized; I simply have nothing left to give. I don’t regret it; I just want my trunk back, my branches back, and that decade-old excitement – ​​that transient state – all of which I invested in Simmons. But perhaps my loss is not his fault or mine, but that of the times. That condition, that branch, broke off at some point, and now it is just a piece of driftwood, lost to time.