Grizzlies point guard Ja Morant will miss at least three weeks due to a left elbow injury. Morant sustained a UCL sprain in his left elbow during the team’s home game against the Hawks on Wednesday, the team announced (via Twitter).
He will be reevaluated in approximately three weeks.
Along with impacting Memphis’ chances of making the postseason — the Grizzlies are currently in 12th place in the Western Conference — Morant’s injury could have a major implications on the front office’s approach to the trade deadline.
Reports surfaced early this month that Memphis was open to trading Morant. His latest injury will likely make it more difficult to deal him to any contender seeking point guard help.
Even prior to the injury, the market for Morant was limited at best. He has two more years and $87MM remaining on his five-year max contract after 2025/26. He’s making $39.4MM this season.
Conversely, the Grizzlies might be more motivated to go into sell mode, including their other star, big man Jaren Jackson Jr. To this point, they’ve shown no interest in entertaining the idea of moving Jackson.
Morant recently returned from a calf injury that sidelined him for over two weeks. He has been highly effective in the two games since recovering from that injury. He posted 24 points and 13 assists in a win over Orlando on Sunday and had 23 points, 12 assists and three blocks in 30 minutes against the Hawks.
Morant has only suited up for 20 games this season, averaging 19.5 points and 8.1 assists per contest.
All the most likely traded players are going down with injuries
They will probably get traded in the off season now
Damn will this affect his hand gun game?
Nahh he is right handed
AKA I don’t want to get traded from this team.
Lol ok I’ll stop being cynical about all these injuries from now on
The whole league hurt
Too many games.
Mr. Glass
Would love to see how much money was paid out to non play due to injury. Injuries seem so common outs rare to ever see anyone play 82 games.
Dang, just did a search and only 11 guys played all 82 games last year. And one of them was Chris Paul!
It’s crazy how many guys take off 25% of the season.
“…take off 25% of the season.” What, are you suggesting they should just play through injuries and aggravate them?
It’s crazy you think that many people are actually hurt.
Doesn’t matter, pick a league, none of them play as many games as they used to. Nobody completes a season anymore.
And you know that this due to laziness, how? There are many other explanations (intensity of play, travel demands, length of season, etc.) that could account for a rise in injury rate
Who would have thought Zion would have competition when it came to “most injury prone player from the 2019 nba draft”
Still a Grizzly ……. Till end of year…??
It’s sickening how many games this guy loses to a so called injury….his butt hurts and he needs 3 weeks off because of it……Lol!!