The Philadelphia 76ers shocked the basketball world recently after they decided to fire Doc Rivers as the team's head coach. This came shortly after the Sixers suffered a devastating NBA Playoffs second-round exit at the hands of the Boston Celtics. As it turns out, however, even superstar big man Joel Embiid was left shell-shocked by this unexpected turn of events.

According to team president of basketball operations Daryl Morey himself, Embiid was not expecting the Sixers to act so decisively on Rivers. There were a lot of rumors surrounding the tenured coach's job security in Philly, but not even Joel Embiid saw this coming:

“He was very close with coach Rivers and, yeah, he was shocked about the change,” Morey said, via Rob Tornoe of The Philadelphia Inquirer. “It’s my job to help convince him that the new coach is someone that he’ll have a great relationship with as well.”

Does this mean that Embiid, the league's newly-crowned Most Valuable Player, was bypassed in the decision to give Doc Rivers the axe? I mean, he had to have some say in the matter, right?

It is also worth noting that rumors also emerged about James Harden not wanting to return to the Sixers if Rivers was still at the helm. We all know the history between Daryl Morey and Harden during their time together with the Houston Rockets, so surely, James' sweeping declaration must have played a key role in the decision to fire Doc. Did Harden's demands outweigh Embiid's opinion on the issue, though?