As the 2023-24 NBA season winds to a close, several teams are shutting down critical star players in the hopes of tanking for maximal lottery luck. Other teams, meanwhile, angling for postseason success, are striving desperately to see some stars heal. Let’s unpack a few of those options.
It has just been announced today that the New York Knicks will be without All-Star power forward Julius Randle, their second-best player, for the rest of the year. Adrian Wojnarowski of ESPN reports that Randle is set to have shoulder surgery.
Earlier this week, Randle’s teammate Josh Hart revealed he was skeptical that Randle and the team’s other starting forward, wing OG Anunoby, would be back at all, per ESPN’s Tim Bontemps. This was before the decision to officially treat Randle’s shoulder (he’s been out for two months) via surgery had been announced.
Anunoby, a critical part of Toronto’s 2019 championship team, has averaged 14.5 points on .497/.364/.825 shooting splits, 4.9 rebounds, 1.7 steals, 1.6 assists, and 1.1 blocks in his 17 available games with New York.
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“I’m looking at it like this is the team we’re going to have,” Hart said. “I think that’s how we have to approach it, that those guys aren’t coming back and obviously we’ll be pleasantly surprised if they come back. I’m not in those medical conversations or anything like that … but we’ve got to approach every game and the end of this season that those guys aren’t coming back, and if they do, be pleasantly surprised.”
Anunoby, who made an instant winning impact on New York upon arriving in a trade with the Toronto Raptors, had surgery to correct a right elbow injury in January, returned briefly in mid-March, and has been on the shelf ever since after suffering a setback.
In recent remarks to the press, Dallas Mavericks head coach Jason Kidd revealed that upstart rim-rolling rookie center Dereck Lively II, the No. 12 pick in the 2023 draft out of Duke, could be out for the rest of the regular season due to a right knee injury incurred on Sunday, per The Dallas Morning News’ Brad Townsend. Happily, the Mavs are looking capable of a deep playoff run, so that may not mean he’s done for good this year.
“It could be two weeks where he could be out, but we’ll see how he feels,” Kidd said earlier this week. “We’ll take it day by day, but hopefully he’s back sooner than later.”
As Townsend notes, Kidd called the injury a “sprain,” though it has been listed as “soreness.”
Across 23.5 minutes in 55 healthy contests this year, he’s averaged 8.8 points on 74.7% field goal shooting (mostly around the rack), 6.9 boards, 1.4 blocks, 1.1 assists, and 0.7 steals per game.
The Utah Jazz are, for the second straight season, fully embracing the tank as the regular season wraps up. Utah revealed via its official X account that All-Star forward Lauri Markkanen re-injured his right shoulder impingement over the weekend. He is set to be reassessed in two weeks… i.e. after the regular season has ended. In 55 games this year, he averaged 23.2 points on .480/.399/.899 shooting splits, 8.2 rebounds, two dimes and 0.9 steals a night.
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Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.