Ben Simmons’ South Florida Sails won the 2026 SFC Walker’s Cay Open over the weekend, putting the 29-year-old former NBA star in the middle of a very different kind of headline. Simmons is the controlling owner of the team, and the victory gave his fishing venture a clean result at a time when his basketball future remains unsettled.
By the end of the weekend, Capt. Mike King, Brad Adam, Ben Simmons and company had announced themselves as a force to be reckoned with, the Sails’ site said. The win came in a Sport Fishing Championship season that runs from April to October and overlaps the NBA Draft, Draft Combine, Summer League, free agency, training camp, preseason and the start of the 2026-27 NBA season, a calendar collision that leaves little room for an easy read on what Simmons might do next.
The timing matters because Simmons has not been linked to any clear basketball path. There has been zero chatter about him fitting on a 2026-27 NBA roster or returning to the NBL, and the current reality is that he is in professional fishing, not in a training camp. A couple of days before the win, he posted from the Florida Keys on Instagram and said he is spending more time “offline than on the phone,” a line that fit the way he has been operating lately: less visible, less available, and increasingly removed from the league that once defined him.
That is a sharp turn for a player who once looked like one of basketball’s brightest young talents. Simmons earned USD $203.3M across a nine-year NBA career, was Rookie of the Year in 2018, made three All-Star teams from 2019 to 2021, and reached the All-NBA Third Team and the league’s steals lead in 2020. He also made the NBA All-Defensive First Team in 2020 and 2021, and before the start of the 2025-26 season, Dirk Nowitzki said, “I mean, he had all the talent in the world,” adding, “Not quite sure all the stuff that happened there in Philly, but it was disappointing.” Nowitzki also said, “He was like the rising star there for a long, long time. So we’ll see what happens.”
Simmons’ last NBA game came on May 30, 2025, for the Los Angeles Clippers against the Denver Nuggets, and he played 4:42 minutes. In the first round of the 2025 Playoffs, he was a DNP-coach’s decision in Games 6 and 7 against Denver, a stretch that underscored how quickly his role had eroded by the end of his last season. He became an unrestricted free agent afterward, and he danced around signing with the New York Knicks without landing a deal.
His basketball history still stretches back to the Australian program, where he played twice for the senior national team at the 2013 FIBA Oceania Championships. He was the national high school player of the year and a McDonald’s All-American in 2015, then a consensus first-team All-American at LSU in 2016, where he also won USBWA National Freshman of the Year, first-team All-SEC and SEC Freshman of the Year honors. He has reportedly expressed an interest in trying to earn a spot ahead of the 2027 World Cup and 2028 Olympic Games, but for now his public momentum is coming from the water, not the hardwood.
The Sails’ victory does not settle the question of a comeback, but it does show where Simmons’ energy is going. At 29, with a new title in fishing and no obvious NBA opening in sight, he looks far more likely to keep building a second act than to force a return to the one he left behind.
