Injuries Defining Western Conference Championship Picture
The NBA has changed dramatically since the late David Halberstam published The Breaks of the Game, his essential basketball tome about the Portland Trail Blazers, following their 1977 championship run, in 1981. The accommodations—medical, travel, personal and otherwise—to which the pros have access today far outstrip those with which the Blazers of yesteryear had to cope.
But at least one key component of the Association of old hasn't changed: injuries, their prevalence within the league and the jarring effect they can and often do have on the way the NBA proceeds from game to game, week to week, month to month and season to season.
Like Bill Walton before him, Kevin Durant now finds himself a former MVP with a bad foot that threatens to derail his career, submarine the Oklahoma City Thunder's long-term outlook and shake up the championship chase for this season—and possibly beyond.
The Thunder announced Friday that Durant will undergo a third procedure to repair the Jones fracture in his right foot that first came to light in training camp and has stubbornly refused to heal properly ever since. As a result, Durant will miss the remainder of the 2014-15 season and won't be back on the hardwood in any capacity for four to six months.
The possibility of Durant spending the rest of the season in recovery first came to the fore a week ago, when the Thunder pulled him from basketball activities following a brief return to practice.
"He's not making the progress that we had hoped and anticipated him making," Thunder general manager Sam Presti said at the time, per The Associated Press' Cliff Brunt. "He still has some soreness in his foot, and the protocol that's in place calls for him to be able to compete on the floor without that at this stage."
Clearly, this latest development further jeopardizes whatever slim hopes OKC had of even sniffing the second round of the playoffs this year. If Durant's foot problems persist after this, they may well undercut the Thunder next spring, as well.
To be sure, Durant's absence isn't the only one with which the Thunder are coping. Serge Ibaka might not be back until next season on account of recent knee surgery. Nick Collison and Andre Roberson are both nursing ankle injuries, leaving OKC's supporting cast rather thin as a result.
The Thunder aren't alone in this regard. If anything, they're but the worst case among a collection of clubs dealing with physical ailments that have transformed the Western Conference playoff picture from a battle for the NBA Finals to a war of attrition.
The Houston Rockets survived 26 games sans Dwight Howard with their hold on the No. 3 seed intact. But recent setbacks to Patrick Beverley's wrist, Terrence Jones' ribs and Donatas Motiejunas' back could seriously hinder James Harden's hopes of advancing in the postseason after back-to-back first-round ousters to begin his stint in Space City.
Elsewhere in Texas, the Dallas Mavericks, while relatively healthy now, saw some of their fragile chemistry undercut after the All-Star break when Rajon Rondo, Tyson Chandler and Chandler Parsons all missed time.
Surely, the San Antonio Spurs wouldn't be on track to start their title defense on the road were it not for ailments of one sort or another that sidelined Kawhi Leonard, Tony Parker, Manu Ginobili and Tiago Splitter (among others) here and there.
The Blazers, a team with a tragic history of terrible injuries (as mentioned earlier), had the look of a potential Western Conference champion until Wesley Matthews pulled up with a torn Achilles tendon three weeks ago. Since then, concerns over Nicolas Batum's back and Chris Kaman's shoulder have rendered a thin roster even thinner.
And that's to say nothing of the bum thumb that LaMarcus Aldridge has been playing with since late January.
The Los Angeles Clippers have won six in a row with Blake Griffin back in the lineup, after the All-Star forward missed more than a month recovering from a staph infection in his elbow. They'll be hard-pressed, though, to make much of a run this spring unless/until Jamal Crawford returns from a nasty calf contusion to rescue L.A.'s moribund bench.
No team has been safe from the wrath of the injury bug, not even those nipping at OKC's heels in the push for the No. 8 seed. The Phoenix Suns have gotten back into the thick of things, despite losing the recently acquired Brandon Knight to an ankle injury for the past seven games. The New Orleans Pelicans might be planning for Anthony Davis' first foray into postseason basketball if not for the stress reaction in Jrue Holiday's right leg, the sprained MCL in Ryan Anderson's right knee and the Brow's own shoulder woes.
Keen observers will note that two important (and impressive) Western Conference squads have thus far escaped mention. It's not that the Golden State Warriors and Memphis Grizzlies haven't dealt with injuries this season; rather, it's that they've endured relatively few, and what little time their core constituents have missed hasn't adversely affected the team's overall brilliance.
Golden State began its brilliant campaign devoid of David Lee's low-post scoring skills. The former All-Star missed 24 of the Warriors' first 25 games on account of a gimpy hamstring.
Lee's leg troubles turned out to be a blessing in disguise for the Dubs. His absence opened up a starting spot for Draymond Green, who quickly emerged as the glue guy holding Golden State's NBA-best defense and pass-happy offense together.
The Warriors subsequently spent most of December and the opening days of January without Andrew Bogut, who was battling knee problems at the time.
Bogut's absence didn't do much to deter the Dubs, who went 9-3 while their defensive anchor was out of commission. What's more, the Warriors sported the league's top-ranked offense and third-best defense over that span, per NBA.com, with Marreese Speights filling in for Bogut and Festus Ezeli at center.
When All-Star Klay Thompson sat out three games after turning his ankle, all Golden State did was beat three good teams (i.e. the Atlanta Hawks, New Orleans Pelicans and surging Utah Jazz) by an average of 16.3 points.
And now that Shaun Livingston's left hand is giving him fits, the Warriors have had to delegate the duties of backing up Stephen Curry to Andre Iguodala and Leandro Barbosa—what few duties must be handled behind one of the NBA's leading MVP candidates, anyway.
All told, Golden State is as healthy as just about any Western Conference contender, and what few holes the Warriors have can be (and have been) seamlessly plugged by drawing from the team's incredible depth.
This isn't to say, though, that the Warriors will simply waltz their way into the Finals. The Spurs will surely have something to say about that, now that their proverbial ducks are lining up. The Clippers could challenge their Pacific Division rivals, assuming Crawford returns in time and L.A., as a whole, gets its defense in gear.
And, of course, there's the Grizzlies. Their top players are all in passable (if not proper) playing shape, a season after scraping along for extended stretches without Marc Gasol, Mike Conley and Tony Allen.
Memphis' healthier days portend postseason success. So do Golden State's, now that Curry and Bogut appear to have left their recurring ankle troubles in the rearview.
Chances are, these newly sturdy Warriors will take on the now-snake-bit Thunder in the opening round of the playoffs.
Once upon a time, it was OKC that bore the NBA's standard of fitness. Durant had racked up just six DNPs during his first five seasons as an All-Star. Ibaka had just three under his name since his rookie season. Westbrook hadn't once sat out a game for any reason over the course of his basketball career, dating back to before his high school days.
Now, Westbrook, who missed time last season with a knee injury and more this season with broken bones in his hand and face, is carrying the Thunder without his top two running mates. In all likelihood, that will hold for as long as OKC's still standing.
And to think, just three years ago, the Thunder looked like a budding dynasty with their youth and health intact.
Sound familiar? As Halberstam wrote of those 1976-77 championship Blazers:
"That spring, in 1977, they had won the championship, the youngest team in history to do so, and the exuberance of their youth and the profusion and seeming perfection of their many talents and their rare ability to control their own egos, had seemed to promise yet more, not just that something was over and accomplished, but that it had only just begun.
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A year later, Portland lost Walton, the league's MVP, to his fateful foot injury and was ousted in the first round by the Seattle SuperSonics. The Blazers wouldn't get back to the Finals for another decade.
The moral of the story? In this case, seize the day while you can—or, rather, while fitness permits. Unfortunately, that's a cautionary tale the Thunder can tell too well to the Warriors, Grizzlies or whoever else has designs on winning the West in the months to come.
Josh Martin covers the NBA for Bleacher Report. Follow him on Twitter.
