Jazz center Jusuf Nurkic will undergo a surgical procedure on his nose on Tuesday and will miss the remainder of the season, NBA on Prime insider Chris Haynes reports (via Twitter).
According to Haynes (Twitter link), Nurkic has had issues breathing and sleeping since he broke his nose a few years ago.
Nurkic has appeared in 41 games this season, including 36 starts. The 31-year-old big man averaged 10.9 points, 10.4 rebounds and 4.8 assists in 26.4 minutes per game.
Nurkic hasn’t played since the All-Star break. Earlier in the season, he missed time due to a toe injury and also had several DNP-CDs. He was a prime candidate to be dealt before the Feb. 5 trade deadline due his expiring $19.3MM contract.
The Jazz never found a suitable deal for him, so instead that money will come off their cap and Nurkic will be seeking a new opportunity as an unrestricted free agent. Utah is expected to have significant cap space this offseason to chase free agents and facilitate trades, though the team may also have interest in bringing back Nurkic.
The Jazz raised eyebrows over the summer when they attached a second-round pick to Collin Sexton in a trade with Charlotte for Nurkic, who was coming off a down year. However, the big man played a larger role than anticipated due to Walker Kessler‘s season-ending shoulder injury.
With Nurkic, Kessler, and Jaren Jackson Jr. all out for the rest of the season, Kyle Filipowski, Kevin Love and Oscar Tshiebwe are Utah’s options in the middle.
This one is creative. Gotta give the Jazz credit lmao. Also note that all the Jazz reporting is not done through ESPN and through Haynes instead
As someone who has had four broken noses and surgeries from contact sports, this is about as ridiculous as it gets for an overt tank job. A surgical nose procedure to repair broken bones or sinus related issues is day surgery. A conservative recovery time is days, not weeks. Certainly not months for a professional athlete. But hey, Adam … I guess you can fine the Jazz $5,000 and really make them hurt.
Teams only get fined if the player fits a star category. Nurk is far from that as no awards, all pros, or all star appearances.
I said this on many post. The NBA is destroying its own self. This outright tank by the Utah Jazz is crazy. Jackson’s ‘s had surgery on growth on his knee. Basically his knee wasn’t hurting. We’ll just put it that way. KG has been out for literally 3 weeks and was seen shooting around the other day. Now you got a nose surgery that I’ve had two family members have and as you said their recovery time was literally a week. Give me a break on. I make millions of dollars and can’t sleep or breathe. There’s a backhand deal that he’ll be back but with him in the game he was affecting the game with us passing too much and they have too many other teams trying to tank so they’re out tanking teams. This is a disgrace and honestly disrespectful to the game.
I know people are going to come on and here and say will other teams do it. There’s nothing wrong with tanking 2 to 3 years. The Jazz have already spent 2 to 3 years tanking holding players out to get all the players that they have now. And then they trade some of those players for Jackson just to try to get one more hypothetical pic. I hope they get screwed in the draft and don’t get to keep the pic at all.
They should just have everyone on their hometown team rosters.
The only player pool should be for players from outside of North America. NBA are too afraid to go that route though….SGA, RJ, Dillon Brooks,Wiggins,Edey for raps.
Lakers: Harden,Derozen,Kawhi,Klay,Lopez.
Creative is one way to put it lol; nose surgery?!?He woulda worn a mask the rest of the year if a contender could’ve afforded his contract..I thought Silver was just over reacting about ‘tanking’, but he probably had some idea just how clownish the Jazz and Wiz were about to get so he had to get out in front of it
Honestly, this race to the bottom sure is interesting.
Each team doing something a little different to approach the tank
Fining teams for tanking is ridiculous! The only way to create any interest in teams that have no chance of winning a championship is indeed a race to the bottom! The team with the worst reserves should get the best pick. It all makes perfect sense. Why fine them, instead of provide them with tanking guidelines?
In fact, tanking creates a job opportunities for regular Joe’s.
Ordinary basketball players will go out there and compete, because otherwise they would be punished for shaving points. However, teams can sign people who are naturally bad at basketball to contracts, play them, and legally tank.
I recall that a team once signed someone who was terrible in his college days in order to accomplish this.
Why reward failure?
Does anyone really believe Nurk is factoring in to winning. I don’t even count this as an impact.
Double double with 5 assists per game. He’d been playing pretty well. He’s also been solid defensively this season.
Looter in a riot. Someone has to get the numbers,does not mean he is good or having impact plays. Would he be a starting center on top 4 seeded teams? He would probably be played off court in playoff atmosphere.
“Would he be a starting center on top 4 seeded teams?” Ok. You got me, here I was thinking he was one of best ten centers in the league!🙄
A team being a top 4 seed does not mean they have top 10 is players at each position… you know that. Unless you think Celtics being 2nd seed makes Pritchard, Walsh, and Vu top 10 in position.
Not starting over an Ihart, Wemby, Jokic, Sengun, Gobert, Suns already got rid of him so they prefer their bigs, maybe over Ayton.
East not beating Duren, Kat or Robinson, Embiid, Bam, Allen,
Boston and Magic maybe.
Have you been watching the Jazz play? His passing and pick and roll has opened up everything for the team and they are actually winning. There’s a reason why they’re going so far out of the way to sit players and tank. Because had they play their full lineup at the beginning of the year and with the trade for Jackson, this team would have been a 7 through 9 this year. The tank absolutely makes zero sense unless they give Patterson. Because where is the new rookie going to play?
How are they going to develop this player with a team full of young guys and players if you’re going to be pushing for the playoffs because you lose your pic next year. So the tank job is outrageous in the NBA’s got to fix this or they’re going to mess around and continue to lose revenue and lose fans. On top of that, somebody else said that it gives regular Joe’s a chance at playing in the NBA.
I’ve explained it like this over a hundred times. It’s like somebody getting in the special forces or Delta forces that has no business being in there. The NBA is the elite of the lease. Just like the Delta Force is the elita elite. You don’t just get to walk in there because people are tanking or because there’s not enough soldiers to have somebody on Delta.
Normally no, but the guys available behind him. Not exactly an inspiring group.
@AncientOne: “Does anyone really believe Nurk is factoring in to winning.”
Is he better than his backup? If so, then yes, he’s a factor in winning. They are benching players in order to play inferior players. Whether or not Nurk is a star is not the issue. They’re actively fielding the worst team that they can.
Or they are trying to develop guys to see what they have… OKC figured out Dort, Kenrich, and Wiggins during their 2 year bad spell. None were high prospects they have to play to figure out future.
Pistons have Stewart from the bad years middle 1st and he has stuck around.
Jokic 1st 2 yrs with Nuggets were not playoff level. He was not a starter doing Jokic things, he had to play and was a 2nd rounder not high expectations.
Camara with Portland looks like a contributor he wouldn’t have gotten the chance if they just played vets and continue to lose.
Even if they don’t stick with original team, there are plenty of players that are producing and developed due to getting time from the bad “Tanking” teams. Organization tank not the players.
Utah has been tanking for 3 years. They already know what they have with young players. There’s nothing wrong with tanking. For one season or two seasons. Or if you’re in a gap year like Indiana?. But to outright tank Three four five seasons in a row is ridiculous. They had a chance to build on what they had. As I said many times them in the hornets have no reason to be tanking.
I’m going to give you a little life lesson when you have to do the most for anything, plot or scheme it usually means your in the wrong. There’s a reason why players are getting stupid surgeries and they’re holding players out because the team is good enough
I like Nurk for the Warriors. This is a guy that could play in their system, although not much of a three threat.
Why should a team tank when the league fixes the draft to their liking?
GET RID OF THE LOTTERY TO STOP 1/3 OF THE LEAGUE FROM TANKING.
Even rebuilding his entire septum couldn’t be 3 months, wtf is wrong with his nose?
Should just take away draft picks at this point