Phew, that was close.
On Saturday night, midway through the Memphis Grizzlies’ 134-125 double-overtime preseason victory (WUT), Ronald Tillery of the Commercial Appeal tweeted that Marc Gasol appeared to have hurt his right ankle:
https://twitter.com/CAGrizBeat/status/787468497068576768
Given that Marc Gasol missed nearly half of last season after fracturing that same foot, you can understand the tremor of fear communicated in reactions such as mine:
https://twitter.com/danfavale/status/787471666674802688
The Grizzlies’ ceiling this year is uncertain enough without all their injury risks going the wrong way. Chandler Parsons (knee), Mike Conley (Achilles) and Tony Allen and Zach Randolph (age) are all, like Gasol, question marks to some degree. And more than that, if any one of the Memphis’ four best players go down, the team’s playoff hopes get torpedoed.
Fortunately, Gasol is fine, at least for now, as he himself relayed, per Calvin Watkins of ESPN.com:
Grizzlies center Marc Gasol has a message for the fans: Calm down, he’s fine.
“Please,” he said.
…
“I didn’t have to leave the game. I got subbed out,” said Gasol, who played 20 minutes of the Grizzlies’ 134-125 victory. “Then just used (the time on the bench) to get some ice and remove my ankle tape. That was all.”
Again, phew.
Here’s hoping Gasol, and Conley, and Parsons, along with Allen and Randolph, hold up for all of 2016-17. Memphis’ ability to evade the lottery depends on it.
