Only a month into the 2025-26 regular season, and the NBA training rooms have become crowded with enough players to form two All-Star teams.

Houston Rockets guard Fred VanVleet (torn ACL in right knee) and LA Clippers guard Bradley Beal (fractured left hip) will miss the remainder of the season. Both San Antonio Spurs center Victor Wembaynama and Dallas Mavericks forward Anthony Davis face uncertain returns after both strained their left calves, while Giannis Antetokounmpo (left groin strain) is sidelined as well. Both LA Clippers star Kawhi Leonard (right ankle sprain) and New Orleans Pelicans forward Zion Williamson (strained left hamstring) have struggled to stay healthy once again, though they recently returned.

That’s not all. Consider the other notable players that have spent their time on the bench and in the trainer’s room: Trae Young (MCL sprain on right knee), Ja Morant (sprained left ankle), Jrue Holiday (sore right calf), Jalen Green (strained right hamstring), Christian Braun (left ankle sprain), Jalen Williams (right wrist surgery), Scoot Henderson (torn left hamstring,) Zach Edey (offseason ankle surgery), Tyler Herro (left ankle surgery).

That prompted EssentiallySports to consult various medical experts to share their analysis on the state of the game, which injuries concern them the most and more.

The panel included:

Gary Vitti, Los Angeles Lakers’ former head athletic trainer (1987-2017)

Dr. Evan Jeffries, Doctor of Physical Therapy with Evolving Motion

Dr. Nirav Pandya, Professor of UCSF Orthopedic Surgery

Dr. Kevin Parvaresh, sports medicine surgeon at Orthopedic Specialty Institute/Providence St. Joseph Hospital

Dr. Dean Wang, MD, Chief, Sports Medicine, UCI Health

None of them work with any NBA team directly or have access to any of the players’ medical records. But they have plenty of medical insight.

Editor’s note: The following interviews were conducted separately. The answers below have been edited and condensed.

What do you make of these early-season injuries compared to other years?

Vitti: “Generally speaking, soft-tissue injuries can be related to training error. That includes fatigue and overuse. But ankle sprains and the like are pretty much bad luck. All the strains, sprains and the ACL are probably related to speed of the game and being able to transfer load from the lower extremity to the upper extremity through the pelvis and dysfunctional movement efficiency.”

Jeffries: “A lot of the soft-tissue injuries that are happening right now (compared to other seasons) is a lot. You have a lot more players and bigger stars coming out. They talk about pace of play. But I think it’s more about space of play because the movement on the court has gotten wider. So they have to cover more ground. Then, players don’t practice as much. The schedules are so chaotic and then they just play games. You go from not practicing to just playing games. That game speed is totally different from practice. But if you’re not having practice, you’re not building up the reps and your muscle strength wanes and puts you at risk to miss a whole bunch of games.”

Pandya: “As Steve Kerr mentioned in the quote that went viral, the pace of play has definitely increased. You look at the metrics. It shows that players are definitely playing faster. The game is being played faster, and bigger players are expected to do more athletic things. The nature of the game is definitely a setup for soft-tissue injuries. Then combine that with the fact that these current generation players are part of the ‘AAU generation.’ They came into the league playing year-round basketball in order to make it to the league starting at ages nine, 10 and 11. So you have a game more explosive and players that already come in with a significant amount of wear-and-tear on their bodies. So that’s the setup for soft-tissue injuries. Then combine the easy-season travel and the back-to-backs and all of the scheduling things.”

Parvaresh: “There’s been a spotlight this year, particularly because there are a lot of star athletes that are getting injured. If you look at the overall injury rate, it is relatively stable compared to prior years. But because there are some big-name athletes, I think it’s getting a lot more attention in the media. But it is a bigger concern because it involves athletes that are of a higher caliber and make larger contributions to their teams. But it’s still early in the season. Though there are a few big injuries that are going to take up the bulk of the entirety of the season, there are lot of injuries that are a couple of weeks here and there with sprains and strains. Those can fully recover.”

Wang: “It may seem like there are more than in most seasons. But honestly, these are typical injuries. It’s the nature of the game. I can’t really say that if there is an increase of those injuries, whether it’s correlated to any changes in the game. An ankle sprain is an ankle sprain. When you play basketball, you can always sprain your ankle. These other injuries are also part of the nature of the sport.”

Explain your stance on why or why not pace of play is a factor to soft-tissue injuries?

Vitti: “The explanation is a combination of physics and how our musculoskeletal system works. Higher forces (tension) are created with low velocity. The opposite is true. Higher velocity is created with low forces (tension). The goal of training is to shift the curve to increase both force and velocity to increase peak power (how fast can you generate high forces). Power equals force times velocity.”

Jeffries: “I grew up in the 80s. Those teams still played up and down the court. The ‘Showtime Lakers’ were obviously running and gunning. That was the ultimate high pace of play. This year’s pace is as close to that pace as it is in years past. But when you look at those teams, players didn’t get as injured as much and they played almost near 70 to 80 games a season.”

Pandya: “From a medical standpoint, it’s jarring. You’re doing something super explosive. You’ve got bodies that are already broken down. Then you’re taking things that we know are associated with poor performance, injury with travel and back-to-backs. That’s a setup for soft-tissue injuries.”

Parvaresh: “That’s an important point. It seems like over the last five to 10 years in the NBA, we’ve seen a much higher pace of play both in terms of sprinting back and forth full court, an emphasis on 3-pointers and on spreading the floor. So you’re seeing a lot of these athletes do a lot more explosive sprinting on the court. That can really impact some of these soft-tissue injuries.”

Wang: “I don’t know if we can pinpoint it to one specific thing. Everybody has their own theories. I think part of it is the game has changed. Teams are prioritizing faster-paced play and interchangeable positions. It’s not the traditional basketball play that I grew up with, where you have your traditional point, center, forwards and shooting guard. Now all five players on the floor can shoot and can cut. Because of that, I think that requires more speed, quicker movements and more cutting. It’s moving basketball. That causes overusage injuries to the lower areas.”

Beyond pace, there’s also the increased sudden stopping and twisting after accelerating. How do those things also contribute to these injuries?

Vitti: “Injuries occur when there is an imbalance in this relationship, especially if the body is trying to slow down (decelerate) and/or turn (torque). Think of it like speeding in a car. The faster you go, the more distance you need to slow down. Turn or stop, it’s the same thing with the human body. The higher the velocity, the more distance the body needs to slow down, turn or stop. If the velocity is high and the distance to slow down is short, it’s going to create more tension in the muscles and tendons to slow down. If the structure cannot handle that tension (load), the structure will fail at the weak link in the kinetic chain. We call this eccentric load.

Examples of concentric vs eccentric load: doing an arm curl is a concentric load of the biceps muscle. The biceps muscle fibers are shortening to lift the weight up. Returning the weight to the starting position slowly against gravity is an eccentric load of the biceps muscle. The biceps muscle fibers are lengthening to lower the weight. Greater tension is created during eccentric contractions than concentric contractions, which is consistent with when and why athletes are injured.

In sports, the human body is transferring force from the lower extremities through the pelvis to the upper extremities. This needs to be done while controlling the center of gravity as the athlete moves through space in an uncontrolled manner. To do this successfully, the athlete needs to have a strong core that can transfer those forces (load) up the kinetic chain.”

Jeffries: “100%. That’s one of my biggest things, especially when it comes to ACL or Achilles injuries. There is a huge Euro influence in the game today with the Euro step and moves that players weren’t making. When you’re making a Euro step or a Euro cut, you have to be able to decelerate the leg as you’re landing. If you’re not training for that or get fatigued as the game goes on, that’s when you can get in trouble.”

Pandya: “Absolutely it does. In general, when you see people get ACL tears, MCL tears or torn Achilles tendons, the vast majority of them are going full speed and then they have to make a cut or make a stop. That rapid acceleration and deceleration places a tremendous amount of stress on the muscles. That’s where you get the calf and hamstring injuries. That can eventually lead to Achilles injuries. In this 3-point era, you’re basically cutting the court down by 20-30%. So you’re going to full speed and then running around to create a sliver of space to shoot a 3-pointer. That is a lot of stress on the joints as opposed to the 80s and 90s when it’s isolation play and backing down. There wasn’t this desire to have to create space for these 3-point shots. So the torque and the twisting play absolutely a big role in that.

As for the type of players that have to do that? It’s everyone on the court. There really aren’t any true centers out there anymore. Let’s use Zion as an example. He’s someone that’s 280 pounds and is forced to play like a guard in a modern NBA offense. You’re going to get these issues with soft-tissue injuries. It’s not just faster pace of play. It’s how the size of people that have to do it are stressing their body beyond what you saw in the 80s and 90s. Patrick Ewing and Hakeem Olajuwon were athletic centers, but they weren’t forced to play at this rapid pace.”

Parvaresh: “That puts a large strain on the soft tissue components of the body, particularly with the muscle tendon and ligament components. When you have that and you’re doing it repeatedly over time, that can cause microtrauma and lead to more major injuries that we’re seeing today.”

Wang: “It contributes to it immensely. With the stop-and-go and the acceleration and deceleration, that puts a lot of work on the lower body, specifically the calves and lower leg muscles. With all of that training and pace of play, I think that contributes to the wear and tear.”

Under the guise that you’re not working with these teams or players directly, which notable star injuries concern you the most?

Vitti: “You are always worried about heart and brain issues. But from a musculoskeletal standpoint, probably the Achilles tendon is the most difficult injury to return to a pre-injury level.”

Jeffries: “That starts with Victor Wembanyama. Any time there is a calf injury, that’s always a concern. That’s probably why the Spurs are a little more cautious. You see what’s happening with Anthony Davis. I thought it was interesting that the owner indicated that he wouldn’t play unless he was medically able to do so. I’m trying to figure out what constitutes medically being able to play. So I think the calf injuries are most concerning.”

Pandya: “There are tons of them. But I worry a lot about Wemby with his calf strain. He is the classic example of everything that you worry about with these injuries. He’s a big player. He’s playing in a way that puts a lot of strain on his body. If this were 10 or 20 years ago, he’d just be down in the paint – dribble, dribble and going to the baseline. Now he’s playing like a guard. He’s a phenomenal talent. But these soft-tissue injuries are things that you worry about a lot. It’s the calf, and that leads to a hamstring [injury] and then possibly something else. That’s more of a breakdown with everything in your body. The soft-tissue injuries always have a tendency to creep back up.”

Parvaresh: “I do have concerns. But when you’re not a team doctor, you don’t really have access to the true underlying diagnosis of a player. Fred VanVleet has a torn ACL, so obviously, that is a major concern. When you look at LeBron [James] dealing with sciatica, we don’t know exactly what is causing that. There can be a lot of different causes, with some being mild and some being more severe and concerning. So I think it’s difficult from an outside perspective unless you really have a true, clear diagnosis to know how severe things can be.”

Wang: “AD has been dealing with a calf strain, and the Mavs have been super slow with him for obvious reasons. He’s the main one with everything the Mavs are going through. Given his injury history and where the Mavs are at, that’s why AD came to mind. It’s not related to him, specifically. But more with the GM getting fired, the Luka [Dončić] trade and the Mavs not doing so well even with Cooper Flagg. Wembanyama also has a calf strain. I think Wembanyama is sort of a freak in the NBA, with someone at his size doing what he does and with his injuries. He had the blood clot last season. We know that very long big men can be prone to certain disorders. With his calf strain, I don’t think of it other than him with the way he plays basketball. He’s always moving. He’s always stopping and going. He’s not a traditional center in that sense where he’s down in the post. He’s playing a lot of his game on the perimeter.”

With calf injuries, to what degree does that lead to Achilles injuries?

Vitti: “Calf injuries correlate to Achilles injuries because tendons attach muscles to bone. The calf muscles are attached to the heel bone by the Achilles tendon. When it looks like athletes are accelerating at the moment they rupture their Achilles or strain their calf muscle, they are actually eccentrically loading the Achilles for explosion. That is creating greater tension in the calf and Achilles. If either structure can’t handle the eccentric load, it will fail.”

Jeffries: “There’s a huge correlation. I think back to Kevin Durant [in the 2019 NBA Finals]. He had a high-level calf injury in the second round of the playoffs. Then, when he came back just a little over four weeks later. Then in his first game, he tore his Achilles. If the calf has been shut down for a while, it’s going to reduce strength. That’s why Tyrese [Haliburton] playing was an ultimate risk. Even when he said he was cleared by the doctors, there’s no way they cleared him without citing the risk to tear his Achilles tendon. When you have a weakened calf, you’re not able to fire as you normally can do. So there’s more force on the Achilles and that can lead to a rupture.”

Pandya: “That’s a great question. I’ve looked at studies. There hasn’t been a direct correlation with that. There was a study that I posted that looked at all the players that had Achilles injuries in the NBA. Only a small percentage had calf injuries. But the vast majority of them had some other injury preceding them. But from seeing patients myself that aren’t NBA players? Once that calf area starts to get impacted, your Achilles is right there. There aren’t enough NBA players to prove it. But in the general medical area, a lot of people that tear their Achilles have pre-existing pain in that calf area. There’s definitely a soft correlation there. There aren’t enough NBA players to prove it. But a lot of these players do say that they had a preexisting injury. Haliburton had a calf injury. KD had it. So there is a part of it that the players are probably having a degree of soreness there before the injury. But they just weren’t mentioning it or the team wasn’t reporting it. That definitely is a correlation. There shouldn’t be 21, 22, 23 or 24-year-olds tearing their Achilles because they don’t have the degeneration that a 36 or 37-year-old should have.”

Parvaresh: “I think there’s a correlation in the sense that it signifies an underlying biomechanical issue with the individual, whether it’s something more chronic versus that soft tissue then goes on to predispose them if they get back too soon. There’s both a direct and indirect correlation with that.”

Wang: “I don’t know if there is a lot of data linking the two. But obviously, it is all connected. Obviously, we’ve seen some high-profile athletes have a calf strain and then later on have an Achilles tear, such as Durant and Tyrese. Once the calf muscle is affected and you don’t have that mobility to use the muscle to push off, that’s going to overload the Achilles. The Achilles heel is the weak point of that unit. Again, I don’t know linking calf injuries as a precursor to Achilles injuries. But it makes sense mechanically.”

Eddie Johnson and Nick Van Exel disagreed with you pretty passionately about your points on X. They mentioned the previous era was more physical, even if it’s at a slower pace. Nick added he’s played basketball on concrete. How do you address those rebuttals?

Pandya: “The first thing in terms of being more physical before, absolutely. The game was more physical in a different way back in the 80s and 90s. The game in that era was the blunt-force trauma. You were going to get beaten up. You were going to get bruised. You were going to get contusions. It definitely was more physical from that standpoint. But you weren’t seeing the ligaments, Achilles and hamstring strains as much because that’s a different type of stress on the body. Both of these eras were physical in different ways.

The era back then was hard. You hurt. You were getting bigger injuries from people being physical with you. But you weren’t seeing these soft-tissue injuries. Now that blunt-force trauma has been clipped on running full speed and stressing the ligaments and joints in a different way. Both eras were physical. But you weren’t seeing injuries back then because they weren’t playing at that pace. That’s the big difference in the type of physicality that you’re seeing.

Then, to Nick’s point about playing on concrete. Yeah, when you’re playing on concrete, there is an increased risk of injury. But the difference is how many hours was Nick playing on concrete and how was he playing? You’re going out there playing on concrete with your buddies a few times a week. That’s not going to stress you as much as when you’re eight, nine or 10 years old and you’re traveling to travel tournaments, working with a strength and conditioning coach and playing 75 games on these circuits and playing in a rapid way. There was physicality back then. But it’s a different type of physicality and also that the game is being played differently.”

How do the rest of you view the old-school players that dismiss the recent trends because the game was more physical and the travel was more strenuous?

Vitti: “The game was much more physical, and the travel was much harder back in the day. But once again, the speed and athleticism of the game today creates much greater forces and other issues.”

Jeffries: “This is how I look at it with how the game is going toward load management. You’re not getting any practice time and then you’re managing minutes and load in games. So essentially, the players weren’t playing enough to build that adaptation that you need to build to become stronger in the bones and stronger in the muscles. So some of those old timers are right. Their bodies aren’t as prepared because they’re not putting as much into it. We have a lot of smart people in the room that are trying to be a little too smart with things. We have so much technology and so many things to offer. But with that technology comes our unique ability just to be an athlete.

But I’ll talk to a lot of athletes in their youth, and my biggest thing is that they’re specializing too early. Now we’re starting to get more of those athletes into the league that did more specialization and not so much cross-training. If you don’t have that cross-training, you’re not getting your muscles to do something different than what you do throughout the year. That’s important because every sport will translate into other sports.”

Parvaresh: “It gets back to the style of the play. Certainly, you can argue about more physical play versus more explosive play, either way, and to what degree the game has really changed. But ultimately we’re starting to recognize that while we do value players’ performance from an entertainment standpoint, we’re also recognizing from some of these former players that had their bodies beat up in professional sports that we also need to consider them as an individual and protect their health for what they might also be doing beyond their professional career, raising their families and post-career. Unfortunately, there is less of an emphasis on the former players. They’re not wrong. It’s just that we know more now. We can treat them more and say we should hold them out because they have these injuries even if traditionally we were having players play more games before.”

Wang: “It’s not just physicality that’s contributing to overusage. It’s all the movement that happens during offense. It’s all the stop-and-go. Banging down low in the post is one thing. But that doesn’t lead to all the injuries that we’re seeing now in terms of calf strains and hamstring strains.”

What are the solutions, at least to mitigate these issues?

Vitti: “When you do the same movement over and over again, the body creates a compensation and the compensation creates a dysfunction. This is even true for micro-movement. People that work in front of their computers over and over again create compensation. That creates dysfunction. Their shoulders become rounded with their head protruding forward. That causes neck and shoulder pain. Years ago, our youth played football in the fall. They went inside to play basketball in the winter, cold months. They went back outside to play baseball in the spring. We followed the weather. As a result, we were cross-training. We didn’t know we were cross-training and the word didn’t exist. But that’s what was happening to our bodies. What wasn’t happening to our bodies was us creating compensation and dysfunctional postures and movement patterns from repetitive movement.

Now, by age seven, you are channeled into one sport and that’s all that you do. By the time we get the athlete in the NBA, they are bigger, faster and stronger than the athletes of the past. But their postures and movement efficiency is not good in relation to their ability to transfer force from the lower extremity through the pelvis, especially as the athlete fatigues. We can get the athlete out of their dysfunctional movement pattern through myofascial release, resistance stretching and activation. That will get them in pelvic neutral. But when their core fatigues, they will slip back into their default movement pattern. That makes them at greater risk of injury. There should be a corrective exercise program that includes myofascial release of the hip flexors, along with stretching the hip flexors and the hamstrings, followed by glute activation and a strong core.”

Jeffries: “That’s a two-part question. It’s a hard one to answer because we’re trying to figure it out with all the analytics. But I think they should at least space out the schedule a little bit more and actually have real practices and have that ability to load your body. Most people should be practicing and not just playing games. But I don’t think shortening the season would do anything. They have 82 games for a reason. Shortening it would change the dynamic. I also think if they just shortened the season, they still wouldn’t figure out how to get practice time. They would still lessen that. If they play 70 games, everybody could still get injured. Adam [Silver] talked about maybe shortening quarters. But I don’t think that would make any difference in reducing the injuries. That would just affect the timing of the game.”

Pandya: “The most tangible thing the NBA can do is limit the back-to-backs. I think that’s an easy thing to do. Nobody is going to shorten the season. But can you spread out the season a little bit more to decrease the wear and tear on a body? What Shams reported on the NBA launching a biomechanics assessment, looking at things through a sports science perspective is important. But the tangible way is to get rid of the back-to-backs and space out the schedule. Can the NBA do that larger educational process for younger players that they don’t need to play 85 games a year at age 10? That way, the athlete they’re getting in is less broken down. It is hard. They’re not going to change the way they play. There’s not going to be a revolution to stop shooting 3s the way that they do. That’s just the way sports are going. They’re more athletic and bigger. But if they can decrease things with load, back-to-backs and travel, that’s good. And maybe not punish teams for load managing. I understand as a fan that you don’t want to pay so much money not to see Stephen Curry play. But if they want their team to succeed, they should allow teams to manage that.”

Parvaresh: “There’s a lot that can be done. The NBA has moved a lot toward load management and becoming a lot more advanced with things like GPS tracking and things that can use objective data. We’re also seeing some AI integration to look at players that are at-risk of injury, even if they can’t feel it. That’s one component. Second component is off-season management to make sure the body is being given time to rest and recover without going through the entire year with a strain. A third thing, which we learned during the Covid season, is making sure that we’re not really pushing games into a condensed timeframe. That doesn’t allow players’ bodies to heal when they’re going at this high-level competitive performance.”

Wang: “That’s a great question. As a physician, we do think about injury prevention. Load management is one, not just in games but in practice and monitoring how much load you’re putting on the guys. Both as a coach and a strength-and-conditioning coach, what are you doing in the offseason to keep these guys fresh? It’s out of my specialty. But we have to take a hard look at the data and develop prevention methods and training methods to strengthen the lower body in a certain way to withstand the stop-and-go movements and the loads that the guys are putting on during the season.

It’s got to be more than just about getting them strong and durable. We’ve got to look at even shoe wear – certain orthotics – and eccentric-loading workouts to prevent injury. Eccentric movement is when the muscle lengthens while you’re loading it. If you’re doing a bicep curl and bringing the weight up, that’s concentric. When you’re slowly bringing the weight down, that’s eccentric. The eccentric loading of tendons and muscles helps to build a person’s strength. That’s the most efficient way. The strength and conditioning coaches are aware of that, and are probably doing it. But we have to look at those methods and measure how productive we are with making those muscles stronger.”

Clearly, the NBA has shown it wants to protect its business interests. They’ve never budged on reducing the schedule. So how do they work within those business interests?

Vitti: “The issue is at the youth level, AAU, etc. By the time the athlete arrives to the NBA level, the compensation/dysfunction issues are already there. Slowing down the speed of the game would help, but I’m not sure how that could be possible. Change the game. You get three points in the paint, two points in the mid-range and one point beyond the 3-point line (laughs).”

Jeffries: “I think a lot of teams need to revamp the medical teams. You want to be pro-player. But you’re trying to get them to understand that there needs to be an adaptation that takes place and they have to be training at a certain level in order to get on the court and stay injury-free.”

Pandya: “Can you increase roster size a little bit so you don’t have guys playing 40-45 minutes? At a certain point, the NBA has to weigh the financial part of it. How much money are they actually losing by having a player like Wemby play only 60 games? Can that prompt them to extend the season out a few weeks so that more stars are playing and less are likely to get injured? What’s the financial loss with players like Jayson Tatum and Tyrese Haliburton being out for the season with their Achilles injuries? If they extend it out, do we have data that shows that will decrease injuries? I think it’s pretty easy to prove. And financially, that’s better for the league.

Also with the injuries, what do they mean for the players’ careers? We have a tendency to look at the players that make it back from injury. But these are still career-altering injuries. If the NBA looks at it like, ‘We have 20-25 stars in this league that generate a lot of revenue for us. The last thing we’d want is for their career to be altered or changed. So let’s make these changes so we can protect our investment in these players.’”

Parvaresh: “The difficulty with that is that in 2023-24, the NBA came out with the Player Participation Policy program. So a player has to have 65 games at 20 minutes or more in the whole season to be considered for these individual awards. Most of the top-tier players would want to be in consideration for this because it affects their contracts. So it seems pretty clear what the NBA is looking to get out of these players. That makes it very hard from a coaching, training and medical staff foundation to treat injuries the way that they should be treated scientifically. That can impact players. As an outside physician, our role is really just to educate the players and staff on the risks and benefits in playing with injury and the timeframe. But what we’ve actually found is because of these big contracts, a lot of times because of medical legal issues, team physicians and training staffs have to take more of a conservative approach so that things like the Achilles injuries we saw last season don’t come back to arguments over playing time, early integration and things like that.

With limited practice time, I think that can play a big role early in the season with changing gears from the offseason to training camp to in-season. That’s probably where they can play a big role with injury protection. But I think if you look at the schedules in season week-by-week, especially with traveling, players are going to get a lot of exercise during the games. It’s reasonable to consider that for someone to go at 100% at their level and lifting weights, you have to have built-in days of rest to allow the body to recover. So that’s really more about the expertise of the coaches and the athletic training staffs to make sure the baseline level of an individual’s endurance and strength needs to be protected. But then, the time that you’re asking a player to go full speed at a high level for an extended period of time during game play really needs to be monitored to protect their long-term health.”

Wang: “This is more conjecture from being a fan than as me being a physician. But I think you increase your rotation. You keep guys fresher. Instead of going seven or eight deep, you go 10 to 12. Some of the teams are obviously trying to give players off on back-to-backs. I know the NBA is trying to cut down on that. But it’s all in the spirit of trying to keep these guys fresh and not wear out their bodies. There’s a reason why in the playoffs that we had so many of these injuries. Guys are ramped up and ready to go. But they also already played 82 games.”

Mark Medina is an NBA insider for EssentiallySports. Follow him on X, Blue Sky, Instagram, Facebook and Threads.