Thunder’s Dieng Out At Least Six Weeks With Wrist Fracture
Thunder rookie Ousmane Dieng, the No. 11 overall pick of June’s draft, has been diagnosed with a small, non-displaced fracture in his right wrist and will be reevaluated in about six weeks, the team announced (via Twitter).
Dieng also suffered a “slight chip fracture” in his right wrist during Summer League action, but Joe Mussatto of The Oklahoman reports (via Twitter) that the two injuries aren’t related.
Dieng was viewed as a developmental prospect after playing last season for the New Zealand Breakers in Australia’s National Basketball League. The French 19-year-old was the first top European prospect to take advantage of the NBL’s Next Stars program.
The 6’10” forward hasn’t played much at the NBA level thus far, appearing in 14 games (15.7 MPG) while averaging 4.4 PPG, 2.9 RPG and 1.4 APG.
However, he has played extensively in the G League — he suffered the injury in Wednesday’s game for the Oklahoma City Blue, the Thunder’s affiliate. In 11 games with the Blue, he averaged 15.8 PPG, 8.7 RPG, 4.4 APG and 1.2 BPG on .449/.343/.700 shooting.
Dieng hasn’t been a regular member of the Thunder’s rotation, so his absence won’t necessarily impact other players. Still, it’s an unfortunate setback for the versatile teenager, and hopefully he recovers quickly.
Stephen Curry Will Miss Multiple Weeks With Shoulder Injury
4:50pm: Curry has been officially diagnosed with a left shoulder subluxation, the Warriors announced (via Twitter). The team hasn’t provided an official return timeline yet, but Charania said on The Rally (Twitter video link) that Curry is not expected to need surgery and will likely miss around a month with the injury.
Anthony Slater of The Athletic reports (via Twitter) that the “prevailing sense” is that Curry will miss around three-to-four weeks, noting that the Warriors play 10-to-12 games during that period of time.
4:00pm: Imaging has revealed that Curry suffered a labral left shoulder injury, reports Shams Charania of The Athletic (via Twitter). Charania reveals that his status will be reassessed in two weeks.
2:51pm: Warriors All-NBA point guard Stephen Curry will be sidelined for at least a couple weeks with a left shoulder injury, sources inform Adrian Wojnarowski of ESPN (Twitter link).
Curry injured the shoulder against the Pacers on Wednesday during the third quarter of a 125-119 loss, and was set to undergo imaging on Thursday. The Warriors are in Philadelphia tonight ahead of a Friday matchup against the Sixers. Per Dalton Johnson of NBC Sports Bay Area (via Twitter), Curry will be getting an MRI today and the team is set to announce further information on the exact nature of the ailment by tomorrow morning.
Golden State, the defending league champion, has gotten off to a relatively lackluster 14-15 start thus far in 2022/23. Without its best player, the 2022 NBA Finals MVP, for multiple weeks, the team will need further offensive output from key backcourt players like Klay Thompson and Jordan Poole to stay afloat.
As Kevin O’Connor of The Ringer notes (via Twitter), the Warriors sport a stellar 118.9 offensive rating and a +7 net rating with Curry on the court, while those numbers fall to a 99.9 offensive rating and a -11.1 net rating without him. Six of the Warriors’ next 10 games come against teams with winning records, though a majority of them will be home matchups. Golden State boasts a 12-2 record at Chase Center, but of course most of those wins have come with a healthy Curry.
Robert Williams Expected To Make Season Debut On Friday
Celtics big man Robert Williams is targeting Friday’s home game against Orlando for his 2022/23 season debut, according to reports from Shams Charania of The Athletic and Adrian Wojnarowski of ESPN (Twitter links).
The 25-year-old had arthroscopic surgery in late September to remove loose bodies from his left knee and to address swelling in that knee. The decision was made for Williams to undergo the procedure when he began his ramp-up process and experienced some discomfort in the knee.
Williams initially underwent surgery on the knee in March after tearing his meniscus.
He was able to return to the court less than a month later and played a part in the Celtics’ run to the NBA Finals, though he wasn’t at 100% in the postseason. The forward/center sat out five games in the second and third rounds of the playoffs and reportedly required extensive treatment as he dealt with fluid build-up.
Williams enjoyed a breakout season in ’21/22, establishing new career highs in PPG (10.0), RPG (9.6), BPG (2.2), games played and started (61), field goal percentage (73.6%), and several other categories. He also helped anchor the NBA’s top defense and was named to the All-Defensive Second Team.
Even without one of their best interior players, the Celtics haven’t missed a beat in ’22/23, sporting the league’s best record (22-7), best net rating (+7.0), and the top offensive rating (118.1). However, their defense has fallen from No. 1 to No. 8, and Williams should help improve that figure.
As Jared Weiss of The Athletic notes (via Twitter), Williams and fellow big man Al Horford are both officially listed as questionable for Friday’s contest. Horford and his wife recently had a baby, which is why he has been inactive since clearing the health and safety protocols — he has missed the past five games.
Clint Capela Out 1-2 Weeks With Calf Strain
Hawks starting center Clint Capela has suffered a strained right calf and will be unavailable for the next one-to-two weeks, the team announced today (Twitter link).
Backup big man Onyeka Okongwu, the sixth pick in the 2020 draft out of USC, will most likely start in Capela’s stead while the vet recovers from his calf injury.
Capela, 28, has enjoyed a solid individual season for what has proven to be a tense interpersonal 2022/23 start for the Hawks. The 6’10” Swiss big man is averaging 12.1 PPG, 12.0 RPG, and 1.3 BPG through 26 games this year. He is connecting on 63.3% of his field goals, mostly in and around the post.
At 14-15, the Hawks are currently the ninth seed in an Eastern Conference loaded with middle-of-the-pack clubs within a few games of one another. Atlanta is just three games behind the fourth-seeded Nets, but also a mere two games clear of the East’s No. 11 seed, the Bulls.
Essentially, even making the play-in tournament will require a decent amount of injury luck, and the Hawks have not quite had that yet, thanks to a two-week absence for starting power forward John Collins, who remains out at present with an ankle injury, and now this Capela ailment.
Nets Fined $25K For Injury Reporting
The NBA has fined the Nets $25K as a result of what it deems to be inadequate reporting of player injuries, the league announced today in a press release (Twitter link).
Brooklyn has been penalized for “failing to comply with league policies governing injury reporting,” the NBA stated.
According to Brian Lewis of The New York Post (via Twitter), Brooklyn was fined as a result of the team’s decision to sit eight players in what turned out to be a surprise 136-133 win over the Pacers on December 10.
The absences for that contest included stars Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving, plus big-minutes rotation players like guard Ben Simmons, swingman Joe Harris, starting forward Royce O’Neale and starting center Nic Claxton.
This lack of timely transparency with regards to player availability is an approach that doesn’t always endear itself to the NBA, which has targeted teams’ wallets in the past for these incursions.
2023 NBA All-Star Voting To Commence Tuesday
Voting for the 2023 NBA All-Star Game in Salt Lake City will begin this coming Tuesday, December 20 at 10:00 a.m. CT, per a league press release.
Fan voting will run till Saturday, January 21 at 10:59 p.m. CT. All-Star Game starters, voted on by a combination of fans, players and media, will be unveiled during a TNT broadcast on Thursday, January 26.
All-Star reserves, as voted on by head coaches, will be subsequently revealed on Thursday, February 2.
Fans will be permitted to vote once per day, either by accessing NBA.com or the league’s new NBA App. The NBA also indicated that it will feature six days during which fan votes count for triple their normal value: December 25, January 1, January 6, January 13, January 16 and January 20.
As has been the case in recent years, fan voting will be weighed as 50% of the cumulative All-Star starter voting tally, while the other 50% will be split between players and media. Two guards and three frontcourt players will be elected starters in each conference.
The two players who receive the most votes in either conference will serve as team captains. In recent years, captains have drafted their teams during a live TNT broadcast.
All-Star Weekend will tip off in Utah on Friday, February 17, while the All-Star Game itself will take place on Sunday, February 19.
Mavericks’ Maxi Kleber Tears Right Hamstring, Out Indefinitely
Mavericks forward Maxi Kleber tore his right hamstring at a team practice Tuesday, Dallas has announced (via Twitter).
The extent of the damage to the ligament had previously not been known, and the ailment had first been diagnosed as a sprain, but clearly further analysis has indicated that the outcome is more severe.
Shams Charania of The Athletic (Twitter link) initially reported that Kleber was expected to miss six-to-eight weeks, but Tim MacMahon of ESPN (via Twitter) suggests that treatment options, including surgery, are still being weighed, so it sounds like there’s no set timeline yet. The Mavericks have ruled the forward out indefinitely.
As Brad Townsend of The Dallas Morning News tweets, the Mavericks have gone just 1-5 in the six games Kleber has missed thus far this season. Reserve center Christian Wood seems to be in line for more minutes now, Townsend adds.
Across 25.6 MPG, the 6’10” Kleber had been averaging 6.2 PPG on .490/.369/.786 shooting splits in 22 games for Dallas. The 30-year-old also has chipped in 3.5 RPG, 1.0 APG and 1.0 BPG.
Losing Kleber for an extended period will be a major loss for the Mavs’ frontline. His relative mobility for his size and his ability to shoot triples at a solid clip (36.9% on 3.0 tries a night) made him a reliable bench option for the 14-14 club.
And-Ones: Award Frontrunners, Possible Tankers, Trade Market
Celtics forward Jayson Tatum is the choice for Most Valuable Player one-third of the way through the 2022/23 NBA season, Nekias Duncan of BasketballNews.com argues in an early-season award ballot. Tatum is averaging over 30 points, eight rebounds, and four assists per game with terrific shooting numbers and is a candidate for an All-Defensive spot on the other end of the floor, according to Duncan, who contends that doing all that for the NBA’s best team makes the MVP award Tatum’s to lose.
Duncan also checks in on the NBA’s other award races, selecting Bucks center Brook Lopez as the top candidate for Defensive Player of the Year, Magic forward Paolo Banchero as the early Rookie of the Year frontrunner, and Bucks forward/center Bobby Portis as his Sixth Man of the Year choice, among others.
Here are a few more odds and ends from around the basketball world:
- Which teams should be throwing in the towel on 2022/23 and focusing on next year’s draft? John Hollinger of The Athletic breaks down the potential tankers, ranging from the “pull the plug already” group (the Pistons and Hornets) to the “one injury away” tier, which includes playoff hopefuls like the Heat, Mavericks, and Raptors.
- A panel of SI.com basketball writers – including Howard Beck, Chris Mannix, and Chris Herring – prepared for NBA trade season by identifying a player they expect to be moved, picking an intriguing team to watch, and naming a trade they’d like to see happen this season. Three of the five panelists pointed to a Bradley Beal deal as one they’re hoping for, even if it’s probably unlikely in the first season of his five-year contract with the Wizards.
- Michael Pina of The Ringer poses and explores nine questions related to the trade market, including whether the league-wide parity we’ve seen so far this season will catalyze or stifle negotiations. Like those SI.com writers, Pina would welcome some action on the Beal front, referring to the union between the All-Star guard and the Wizards as “the most frustrating dead-end relationship in the entire NBA.”
Western Notes: Westbrook, Mavs, D. Rose, Barton, Robinson-Earl
Sam Amick of The Athletic is the latest NBA reporter to state that Lakers guard Russell Westbrook appears increasingly unlikely to be traded before this season’s deadline, citing a source with knowledge of the team’s plans. A similar report surfaced earlier in the week.
Based on how Westbrook has performed in a sixth-man role, he has made himself more valuable to the team as an on-court contributor than as a trade piece — Los Angeles would have to attach draft asset to get a team to take on his $47MM+ expiring contract. Most of the recent trade rumors involving the Lakers have revolved around a Patrick Beverley/Kendrick Nunn/draft pick(s) package rather than one that includes Westbrook.
Here are a few more items from around the Western Conference:
- The Mavericks have expressed a “level of interest” in Knicks point guard Derrick Rose, a league source tells Stefan Bondy of The New York Daily News. However, Bondy suggests Dallas wants to get a longer look at Kemba Walker before deciding whether to address its backcourt on the trade market. Rose, who is earning $14.5MM this season and is out of New York’s rotation, likely doesn’t have much value at this point.
- Before facing his old team in Denver on Wednesday as a member of the Wizards, veteran guard Will Barton reflected on his eight-year tenure with the Nuggets, writes Mike Singer of The Denver Post (subscription required). Barton said he enjoyed seeing the club evolve from a lottery team to a contender during his time in Denver. “Just to be a part of that whole foundation, laying the bricks, to see where they are today,” Barton said. “Knowing that I was a part of that is gratifying enough for me.”
- Thunder forward/center Jeremiah Robinson-Earl isn’t expected to return from his right ankle sprain anytime soon. Head coach Mark Daigneault referred to Robinson-Earl as week-to-week rather than day-to-day, according to Joe Mussatto of The Oklahoman, who tweets that Daigneault called the injury an “impressive” sprain.
Pacific Notes: Wiseman, Kuminga, Green, Suns, Lakers
Some league executives believe the Warriors will make one or more of their recent lottery picks available in trade talks this season, says Steve Bulpett of Heavy.com. One of those execs told Bulpett that he thinks we could see James Wiseman or Jonathan Kuminga on the trade block, with Golden State seeking another reliable veteran to plug into the team’s rotation.
“(The Warriors) think (the young players) are decent enough talent-wise, but they just don’t think they can put those kids on the floor and execute,” the executive said. “They recognize their talent and their athletic ability; they just don’t have the execution piece.
“And their logic is this: they only have X number of years of Steph Curry‘s elite level of play, and they don’t want to waste any of it. So far those two kids have just not developed in the same way Jordan Poole has, and I would think there’s somebody out there who’ll say, ‘Yeah, I’ll take one of those young guys and see if I can’t, with patience, get them to develop.'”
The exec went on to say that he doesn’t think it would take a star player to pry one of those youngsters away from the Warriors, arguing that the defending champions simply need a solid veteran who can be counted on and is “not going to get in the stars’ way.”
Here’s more from around the Pacific:
- Warriors forward Draymond Green had an altercation with a fan in Milwaukee on Tuesday and claimed after the game that the fan said “some threatening things to my life,” according to Kendra Andrews of ESPN. The fan was ultimately kicked out of the arena after Green told a referee what happened, but the former Defensive Player of the Year expressed frustration that there aren’t more repercussions for that sort of behavior. “There are no real consequences,” Green said. “Yeah, you can’t come back to the game, or even if you get arrested, nothing really happens … you just hope it gets to a point where these leagues can work with legislators to implement laws, because that’s the only thing that’s really going to correct the issue.”
- Deandre Ayton (left ankle sprain) and Devin Booker (left hamstring tightness) are listed as questionable for the Suns‘ game on Thursday vs. the Clippers, tweets Gerald Bourguet of GoPhnx.com. Booker has missed Phoenix’s last two games, but said on Tuesday that he feels “healthy” and “strong,” per Duane Rankin of The Arizona Republic, so his return appears imminent. The team will be without point guard Cameron Payne, who left Tuesday’s loss due to a right foot sprain, Bourguet adds.
- Bill Plaschke of The Los Angeles Times and Mirjam Swanson of The Southern California News Group argue that the Lakers owe it to LeBron James and Anthony Davis to make a trade to upgrade the team’s supporting cast, given how well the stars are playing and how little help they’ve had.