I mean - I dislike other players who were never ROY and who have never said they should be DPOY. By doing those things, Simmons draws attention to himself and gets noticed.
Frankly, it's the good players that are more likely to be noticed and not liked if they are unlikeable. I suppose if they were horrible and said they should be an all star or something, and were unlikeable, then I'd notice them and not like them too. But Simmons has that great quality of not only drawing attention to himself and also being unlikeable. I'm sure there are other players in the NBA who are unlikeable that I just don't know about.