Data Shows Joel Embiid Ran an Unprecedented All-Star Campaign

ESPN's TrueHoop has a really interesting piece today that takes a look at Twitter and its role in the All-Star voting process.

It looks at how the NBA attempts to weed out what could be considered "fraudulent" voting activity -- bots for instance -- but also takes an interesting look at where different players' votes were distributed.

ESPN employed the help of "social media intelligence firm Graphika, which monitors, categorizes and maps social media traffic for public and private clients" to sift through "more than 5 million tweets."

Turns out, Justin Bieber's influence has purpose. He almost single-handedly helped Chris Paul get a nod.

Some players like Kevin Durant relied heavily on their team's fanbase. Joel Embiid's social media savvy, on the other hand, is so darn on point that he got votes from all corners of the Internet, not just from Sixers fans.

ESPN's praise of JoJo is great:

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PHILADELPHIA 76ERS CENTER and social media darling Joel Embiid is inventing new and better ways to connect with fans. Graphika found that Embiid's aggressive and colorful Twitter campaign to drum up support for his All-Star candidacy created a robust group of digital followers that is unlike other NBA stars. For instance, Kevin Durant's online votes came largely from Warriors fans, but Embiid received love from 76ers fans, Eagles fans and Jayhawks fans as well as social activists and many others. A full 84 percent of the accounts supporting Embiid were from communities outside of the local Philly sports scene, including national pro and college sports fans as well as music and entertainment fans.

"This is who you want to be," Kelly said after examining Embiid's results. "This is the picture of success."

We've anecdotally known JoJo's social media presence has been great for a long time. It's fascinating to read about the data that goes along with it.

Here are just a sampling of the Tweets that helped reach a bigger audience.

Eagles fans:

Hip hop fans:

Baseball fans:

Wrestling fans:

Nerds:

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