Wesley Matthews Injury: Updates on Mavericks Guard's Achilles and Recovery

Dallas Mavericks guard Wesley Matthews continues to make his way back as he recovers from a torn Achilles. 

Continue for updates.

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Latest on Matthews' Playing Status vs. Bulls

Friday, Oct. 23

Matthews will play in Friday's preseason game against the Chicago Bulls, marking the first time the Mavericks will have both Matthews and Deron Williams in the lineup, according to Earl K. Sneed of Mavs.com. 

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Latest on Matthews' Status Ahead of Season Opener

Wednesday, Oct. 21

Tim MacMahon of ESPN tweeted that Matthews is "100 percent confident he'll be ready for [the] opener." 

Dallas opens the season against the Phoenix Suns on Oct. 28.

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Matthews Returns to Contact Drills

Monday, Oct. 12 

Price noted it was the first time Matthews had experienced live contact since his surgery on March 11. After practice, head coach Rick Carlisle said the guard went through "the majority" of drills during the session, via Sneed.

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Carlisle Comments on Matthews' Timeline for Return

Tuesday, Sept. 29

"Some idiot today had some headline saying that Wes wasn’t going to be back until Christmas. I never said that," Carlisle said, per MacMahon.

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Matthews Faces Uphill Climb to Justify Contract 

Matthews, 28, is working his way back from an Achilles injury suffered in March while playing for the Portland Trail Blazers. One of the league's most consistent three-point threats, Matthews signed a four-year, $70 million deal with Dallas this offseason—perhaps the most polarizing contract of the summer. 

For many, the deal was seen as a major risk given the less-than-stellar track record of NBA players returning from Achilles injuries. Chris Towers of CBS Sports wrote a historical breakdown of the injury in March, noting players almost never return to their previous level of performance and often wind up seeing a marked decrease in playing time.

Matthews, as noted in an interview with Sneed, has remained confident in his recovery:

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You know, nothing has ever been handed to me. And I said this when I signed in Portland, when people thought that it was outrageous. It wasn’t going to change who I was, and it didn’t. You know, if anything, it made me hungrier. This (injury) is going to do the same thing. It’s just going to make me hungrier to prove not only that I’m worth the money. I’m not concerned with that. I just know that I can play this game, and I know that I can play it at a high level. I know that I can help a team and I’m excited, because Dallas feels the same way.

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Dallas, which looks like a borderline playoff team even if fully healthy, will need all hands on deck. The DeAndre Jordan fiasco and loss of Tyson Chandler leaves the Mavs again without a reliable option at center, and they appear to be content treading water near the bottom of the Western Conference playoff heap.

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