“If Healthy...”: A Look at Injuries and Recoveries Going Into This NBA Season
Alternate title: Multiple multi-billion dollar corporations depend on the fragility of a few 7-foot-tall men's ankles. What a world.
We are hours away from the start of another NBA season. Throughout the lead-up, I found myself struggling with how I think the year will go for so many of these teams.
Basketball, more than any other team sport, relies on the abilities of very few elite talents to bring their franchises success. As a result, those stars’ injuries are equally more devastating for their teams. So when I’m trying to predict how a team’s season will go, I preface my thoughts with the phrase “If everyone stays healthy…”
But not every team will be so lucky. Injuries are an unfortunate and inevitable aspect of sports. They can derail entire seasons, as we saw with last season’s New Orleans Pelicans. The Pels were tied for first in the West on December 30th, but ended up missing the playoffs entirely after Zion Williamson and Brandon Ingram both suffered injuries. The Clippers have had years of disappointment due to their stars’ nagging knee and leg issues.
On the bright side, there are very few injuries that a modern athlete can’t recover from. With enough time and enough experimental treatments from doctors in Germany, athletes are able to come back and play like nothing ever happened.
We’ve got quite a few star-level players returning who missed significant time last year. The sort of guys whose absence completely alters their team’s trajectory. Here are a few teams that have reason for optimism around their returning players:
Charlotte Hornets
Charlotte will be returning their young All-Star LaMelo Ball, who played just 36 games last season due to left ankle sprains and then a right ankle fracture. Ball is the engine that makes the Hornets run. Without him, they were forced to rely on Terry Rozier. Scary Terry is steady enough to keep around, but lacks the efficiency or the playmaking needed to lift Charlotte out of the basement of the NBA.
I’m less optimistic about Gordon Hayward, the other former all-star Hornet, who played 50 games last season. Hayward has averaged just under 49 games played over his last 4 seasons, so it’s safe to assume he’ll miss around that much time
The return of LaMelo should bring Charlotte closer to the Play-In Tournament, especially if they can capitalize on a seemingly down year for the Eastern Conference. There is still uncertainty around Miles Bridges’ role with the team. Between Bridges and the Kai Jones saga, Charlotte has already had more instability than most other teams will have this year. Perhaps injury luck could be a stabilizing force for them.
Minnesota Timberwolves
The T-Wolves went all-in on pairing Rudy Gobert with their elite shooting center Karl Anthony-Towns, only for KAT to tear his calf and miss the majority of the season. He recovered in time for the team’s playoff run, but they matched up against the eventual champion Denver Nuggets.
They put up a good fight against Denver in the first round, lending credence to the belief that this Wolves roster could find playoff success. There’s jubilant optimism around Anthony Edwards and his superstar potential going into this season. Ant showed at the FIBA World Cup this summer that he can be a leading scorer for a high level team.
What he still needs to show is chemistry with his teammates. Edwards showed early reluctance playing with Gobert, saying “The smaller we go, the better it is for me”. It’s tough for a team to mesh if their top three players don’t get a chance to play with each other. But two of their three, Gobert and Edwards, got plenty of opportunities together, with middling results.
On paper, Minnesota has the makings of a playoff team, but they’re going to need time to find their most effective style of play. The question is how much time will the front office be willing to offer this core? KAT has been their guy since he was drafted 1st overall in 2015, and he’s only got three first round playoff exits to show for it. Can they endure another disappointing season? Or maybe will they manage to put it all together this year?
New Orleans Pelicans
They gotta stay healthy at least once, right?
And really, by “they”, I’m mostly talking about Zion Williamson. Since being drafted with the first overall pick in the 2019 Draft, Zion has played in 114 games and missed 203 games.
When he’s on the floor, the Pelicans are a much better team. They were on 48-win pace with Zion last season, versus a 39-win pace without him. Staking so much of your team’s success on an injury prone player has not paid off for New Orleans. Compound that with Brandon Ingram’s growing injury concerns.
Ingram’s games played has decreased each year since his All-Star appearance in 2019-20. Last season, he only played in 45 games. The Pelicans had their hands full dealing with one absentee All-Star, but having two makes it difficult to see New Orleans as anything but a crapshoot contender.
And yet…can you really count them out?
Ingram and Williamson are just 26 and 23 respectively, far from the age where injuries are unrecoverable. Both are going into the season healthy. Both played all four of the Pelican’s preseason games. Maybe this is foolish hope, but I believe we will see a fairly healthy year from one, if not both of the Pelicans’ All-Stars.
Unfortunately, we’ve already started to see some injuries take hold of teams.
Draymond Green will be missing the Warrior’s season opener tonight against the Suns with an ankle sprain. The Pelicans’ stars remain unscathed, but they’re down two key role players in Trey Murphy III and Naji Marshall.
Earlier this week, it was reported that Steven Adams, starting center for the Memphis Grizzlies, will be forced to miss the season after a surgery on his right knee. His backup Brandon Clarke tore his Achilles tendon back in March, leaving the Grizz incredibly thin in the frontcourt. These injuries, along with Ja Morant’s 25-game suspension, make for a bleak beginning to the season in Memphis.
The preeminent “if healthy…” team in my eyes is the Phoenix Suns, who have sold their entire future draft rights to build the Durant-Booker-Beal big three. Since coming up short in the 2021 NBA Finals, Phoenix has revamped their roster. No more Chris Paul. No more Deandre Ayton. Devin Booker is the only player from that squad who is still in a Suns jersey.
To acquire Kevin Durant, Phoenix had to trade away a bevy of assets. Included in the deal were Cam Johnson and Mikal Bridges, both young players who don’t have much history with injuries. Durant is better than both of them, but since tearing his Achilles he’s only averaged 46 games per season.
Phoenix has prioritized championship upside over reliability. They’ve raised their ceiling, but lowered their floor. This is not a team that is concerned with their regular season record. They’re not worried about playoff seeding. What matters most is that they go into the playoffs with all their starters healthy. Because, outside of Nikola Jokic, their biggest obstacle towards winning their first ring in franchise history is their own health.