What Pokémon is Joel Embiid? Tyrese Maxey? Paul George? Someone actually created an algorithm to figure it out.

After Joel Embiid’s 2022-23 MVP season, 76ers president Daryl Morey compared the seven-foot center’s career journey to an iconic character in the Pokémon universe: Dratini.

The rare dragon-type Pokémon introduced in Generation 1 grows constantly and sheds its skin, eventually evolving into Dragonite, a Pokémon with great stats across the board. And, as the only dragon in the first generation, it set the pace for the dragon archetype in Pokémon.

This seems like a valid comparison.

But Pokémon superfan Evan Spellman disagrees. Spellman, a sports analytics addict who did some work for stats site NBA University, created an algorithm using video tracking data and advanced metrics to determine NBA players’ Pokémon comparisons, associating different players with each of the games’ original 151 characters, who grow and evolve as they battle others throughout the game.

The result is Okaymon, Spellman’s project that’s been years in the making.

“It was an idea I had in mind for a long time,” Spellman told The Inquirer. “I’m a ‘90s kid to the core, so I’ve been following the NBA since then. Obviously, I started playing Pokémon back then. I’m always mapping one thing to another in my head, not just this, all sorts of random stuff. So during the pandemic I started building out this data set that I started using for general basketball analysis.”

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The Seattle native reimagined each of the 17 original Pokémon types — like Water, Fire, and Rock — as basketball player types, including Isolation, Pest, Highlight, Cerebral, Clutch, and more.

Spellman’s project took three years to complete, from the initial data collection and creation of the algorithm to adding the finishing touches on his retro-style website.

“The data poll and creating all the algorithms was an on-and-off process of a year-and-a-half to get all of the data that I needed from all of the sources that I needed,” Spellman said. “There’s all these stats that I’m taking from Basketball Index, camera tracking stuff and player tracking stuff, and then the publicly available NBA.com stats.”

But Spellman doesn’t rely on the algorithm all the time. It also has to feel right.

“There are definitely some creative liberties,” Spellman said. “With that algorithm, you’ll see things like, well this player is 15% this thing, 14% this thing, 8% these other things and then the rest is whatever. At that point, you kind of have to take the creative liberties of well, this guy matches with this Pokémon. This guy also matches with this guy too, but based on some fanatic device, something may seem better than something else.”

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In order to give the audience the full Pokémon experience, Spellman collaborated with musician Gaatax for a soundtrack and contacted various illustrators to create the artwork for Okaymon. Every player card you see on the website is original artwork from various artists Spellman found on social media. This was all to elevate the Okaymon experience.

“Games in general are so heightened by a good soundtrack,” Spellman said. “Even a mediocre game can be really lifted, or at least make you remember it, if it has a great soundtrack or something to set the mood.

“I felt like if I could do this and add this part to the project that would just be a more dynamic project. And at the very worst, if the mapping sucks, I know the art won’t suck and I know the music won’t suck, so I’ll have two things going for me.”

Thanks to Spellman’s hard work, we now know which player types and, more importantly, which Pokémon match with Embiid, Tyrese Maxey, Kyle Lowry, and Paul George.

Embiid may thematically be a pair for Dratini, but the math says otherwise. Spellman’s algorithm has the Sixers center listed as an Entangled and Isolationist player type. According to the website, the Entangled player type is extremely polarizing, due to their obstructive and irregular playing style, as they are one of the few types looking to bring more physicality to the game. Isolationist player types specialize in close quarters, chipping away at their opponents — like Embiid in the post or matched up one-on-one out on the wing.

As for the specific Pokémon associated with Embiid? That would be Venusaur — a grass/poison type of Pokémon that is the third and final form of Bulbasaur, one of most well-known original Pokémon. Orlando Magic center Wendall Carter, Jr. is the player linked to Bulbasaur, the first evolution of Embiid’s line, and Boston Celtics big man Kristaps Porzingis, as Ivysaur, is the second evolution.

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“That [Bulbasaur] line was Entangled and Isolationist,” Spellman said. “Specifically with those three [players], how they mapped with each other was you get a lot of high-level mid-range scoring, you get a lot of foul drawing in mid-range, a lot more than other players, and you get great isolation scoring.

“This whole line is just isolation scoring, foul drawing and extremely good rim deterrence and defense around the rim. Embiid is definitely at the top of this center three for sure — that’s why he’s the final evolution.”

Embiid’s player card features an illustration of him with the city of Philadelphia on his back. Spellman collaborated with artist Riley Kayote, a character concept artist from Nigeria, to bring his vision to life.

“I’ve got to give it to Evan for the concept, I just helped him execute it,” Kayote said. “The idea was to make an Embiid-Venusaur design, but we’ll replace the flower-tree design on the Pokémon with the city of Philadelphia for Embiid as a metaphor for how he carries the team and the weight of doing so.”

Maxey, the NBA’s reigning Most Improved Player, landed among the Highlight player type and, with the help of artist Ekong Caruncho, was reimagined as the Pokémon Electrode. Highlight players, according to Spellman, are the most electrifying players in the game, constantly looking to dazzle and impress with their athleticism and speed. Electrode is the last evolution of Voltorb, who is represented by Detroit Pistons guard Jayden Ivey.

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Lowry, the Philly native, is listed as a Tricky and Isolation player type by Spellman’s algorithm. He drew the Pokémon comparison of Haunter, who is the last evolution of Gastly — coincidentally matched with former Sixer Patrick Beverley — and is portrayed by artist Jordan Kinley.

But Spellman’s project isn’t finished — and the Pokémon comparison of George, the Sixers’ most notable offseason acquisition, hasn’t been released yet. He’ll be the fourth Sixer on the Okaymon list, and Spellman gave his best comparison without the help of his algorithm.

“At this point in his career, I will give you two answers,” Spellman said. “I will say one of the most likely things he would be outside of what he is, would be Arbok. A defensive isolation type, super long, super rangy. He’s got snakelike super quick reactions to steal the ball and is excellent at forcing turnovers.

“That would be my number one for Paul George. But, I’ll be damned if that guy doesn’t have a lot of flow type in him. So, Kingler is another potential one.”

We’ll have to wait to see if the numbers agree. In the meantime, there are plenty of NBA-Pokémon comparisons already up on Spellman’s site. Make sure to catch them all.