The Thunder Lost More Than Just Their Title Odds

The unfortunate news yesterday that Jalen Williams will be out for a substantial amount of time. I would imagine by the time maybe that people are listening to this, it will be revealed that Jalen Williams is done for the season. He goes down late in the game between the Thunder and the Clippers. And the best way to describe this injury is a Gordon Hayward type of injury. People remember how Gordon Hayward went down for Boston in 2018. First game after signing with the Celtics. Paul George, same kind of thing. But I think the injury itself was Gordon Hayward-esque because it was the same type of injury where the leg just went the wrong direction, dislocated. Tried my best to avoid the clips of that. Couldn't do it. And look, you can always tell when an injury is bad, if you can't see exactly what happened, look at how the players on the floor react. And you could see Shai Gilgeous-Alexander was broken. Players on the Clippers that saw it, immediately turned around, like couldn't believe what they saw. I saw a player or a guy from the Thunder bench run over and immediately put a towel over the foot of Jalen Williams. He knew it's bad. He's done. He's done for the year. And I guess as we kind of talk about this injury, we both feel obviously very bad for Jalen Williams, had a tough go of it the last couple of years, and is now facing a lengthy rehab to come back from this injury. But the Thunder got a season to play. It's not even November. And this is a team that still considers itself a championship contender. Do you think those dreams, that status goes out the door with this injury to Jalen Williams? I don't think it goes out the door at all. Do I think it will be a little harder without their second best player? Yeah, I do. I think, you know, I heard some of the capologists amongst us talking about, you know, they can apply for an injury exception. I think it's around $14 million. but with the roster and with the amount of money already going out the door would they even use that in truth it's going to be AJ Mitchell who's going to next man up and and look he's a guy who we've been talking about for a couple seasons now Chris who absolutely is starter quality in this league so they have the resources because they're such a deep team but there's a reason also that Jalen Williams was the guy starting J-Dub was the guy starting because he is exceptional I feel awful for him as a person. He's such a nice guy. It has been a rough amount of rehab the last couple of years. And I just think it's always hard for any of us who are not actually doing it to understand how much for these players, their entire day just becomes sitting there and looking at their injury. They can't do the job they're supposed to be doing. So I feel awful for him personally. And yeah, I think it, you know, does it open a slight window? It's not out the door, but is there like a little draft now? Absolutely. We can talk about it. I think you were at the season opener for me it was very reminiscent of back in 2014 you remember in 2013 the Heat obviously won the NBA title on the Spurs with that Ray Allen shot you know absolutely devastated the Spurs a lot of people don't realize that was game six they actually played a game seven San Antonio had the chance to still come back and win that series but they were so broken by what had happened to Ray Allen um it took them the whole summer Gregg Popovich said i think about game six every day, right? And then they came back the next year on a mission. And they were just not only on a mission to win the title, which they did, but they were on a mission to completely game plan and beat the Heat, which they did. And that's what it felt like watching OKC in that season opener. We have structured our entire three months of life around beating Victor Wembanyama and the Spurs. Man, they did it. And now, as you said, you saw Shai's face. He was crying on the court the emotional blow of having to go up that mountain again without J-Dub i think i think it's a lot and i think i think it opens the window a little bit um but they're tough and it is a long season and and i expect this team to compete absolutely yeah i was there on opening night and had a chance to talk to Jalen Williams just for a couple of minutes and he was excited to be back and healthy once again he said he wasn't all the way where he wanted to be offensively wasn't sharp yet physically he felt great defensively he felt he was contributing and he was excited about where the season was going now uh you know this is one of those injuries that's like if it's what it looks like and it certainly appears to be as serious as Gordon Hayward's, then it's not just like recovering from it um physically it's mentally getting back trying to get back to being the player that you were, Jalen Williams is a high-flying guy like you You've got to get back that same bounce, get back that same confidence in your bounce. I don't know if Gordon Hayward ever really recovered from that injury. Some of that circumstance in Boston just wasn't the right fit after he came back. But he just wasn't the same player he was in Utah after that specific injury. Now, as far as them being contenders, I'm cautiously optimistic that they still can be. Mostly because they already have been. like Jalen Williams for more than half the season was out last year i mean in the Thunder they won 80 percent of the games that Jalen Williams didn't play it that's a remarkable number they went eight and two in the playoffs without Jalen Williams now they lost the last two which really is all that matters other than that Mrs. Lincoln how was the play um it's you know that's really all that counts but they have shown that they can compete without them now they did you know lose some backcourt talent, some wing talent. Lou Dort is gone. Aaron Wiggins is gone. To a lesser degree, Isaiah Joe is gone. But you've still got Cason Wallace still there. You've still got Alex Caruso. You've still got A.J. Mitchell still there. And you've got Jared McCain that's still there. So you've got a lot of pieces. Now, I think where they're going to miss him the most is defensively. Dort, because of his size, was able to take on some of that defensive responsibility that Williams abdicated in his absence, but offensively, A.J. Mitchell took off last year, and I think he's going to be in an even better position to take off this year. Jared McCain, he's a little bit hot and cold, but when he's hot, he's really hot out there on the floor. He's shown he can play really well opposite Shea Gildas-Alexander. So I think offensively, they're going to be fine. They may have to play bigger at times to deal with rebounding issues, play Chet alongside Hartenstein, Adebayo. You have to tweak the rotation that way, But I don't, first of all, I don't think they're going to make a trade for the reasons you said, like the money is just, they're not looking to take on any extra luxury tax penalties, but I don't think they have to. I don't think they have to. I think they've got enough pieces there to still be a legitimate threat to win the Western Conference. Yeah, I absolutely think they are. I mean, they almost won it last year, as you said, without J-Dub. And Cason Wallace defensively, if you're talking about that area of the ball, I think he continues to improve and is really someone to be reckoned with. But as I said, there's a reason that Williams was the second-best player on your team and the best player at that position for the Thunder. I mean, they definitely have a bunch of guys to fill in the hole, but it's a big hole left by a really big-time player. Yeah. In addition to being all NBA second team a couple of years ago, he was on the all defensive team a couple of years ago. So that that's a weapon that's going to be very hard to replace with that roster. If Dort was still there, I'd feel much more confident. But without him, you know, you're going to need smaller guys to match up with bigger guys. And that could be problematic. Tough week for injuries. I saw Jalen Suggs go down in the Knicks game. That was just a couple minutes later. It was awful. Three Achilles tears in the preseason, including Ben Simmons. Like, crazy amount of first-week injuries that have kind of changed the landscape some in the NBA. Go ahead. Can I ask you about that for a minute? Look, we have been talking for years about how guys are going at a documentedly faster rate up and down the court. I know we've had different eras of pace in the league, but you have the biggest athletes you've ever had, the strongest athletes you've ever had as a whole, going up and down a court at a speed that is greater than we've ever seen before in terms of the actual foot speed of these guys back and forth. They're big, big bodies. The size of the court has obviously not changed. I'm not suggesting that the Hoosiers measuring tape change, right, that the court shouldn't be the number of feet in the basket 10 feet high. But what do you think that we can do in terms of the game to make it so that those like greater dynamite conditions aren't exploded over and over again for these major players because it hurts the whole season it hurts fans it hurts the bottom line everything and not to mention of course the greatest suffering for the players themselves yeah i'm in favor of expanding training camp making that longer giving guys maybe more time to ease into the speed of the regular season i mean three of those injuries with the achilles did happen during training camp so there's that but you know and i had this conversation with Will Hardy last week and i think he's in favor of lengthening training camp as well for more practice time fewer exhibition games just you know give these guys time to get into the kind of shape you need to be in to play at that kind of breakneck pace that is the NBA the other part of it like Jalen Williams i don't attribute that to uh pace of play with the game he just came down the wrong way just like where he came down the wrong way same thing with Jalen Suggs i think he just kind of got caught in between moves like he was going off the wrong foot i think kind of took three steps going to the basket and that leg just buckled and he's had a long history um of lower body injuries so um if we go on kind of another run of more achilles tears knock on wood that doesn't happen uh or other types of injuries like that that are related to pace of play then yeah i think there's a broader conversation to be had about expanding camp making it longer having guys report early fewer exhibition games because I think that would be a benefit there.