Late February has turned into March, which, in the NBA, means crappy injury announcements just keep on coming.
Joel Embiid has been shut down by the Philadelphia 76ers. Ben Simmons won’t be making his debut until 2017-18. Kyle Lowry is out for an extended period with a wrist injury. The Golden State Warriors will push on without Kevin Durant for at least four weeks.
And now, on top of that, the Portland Trail Blazers will be without Ed Davis for the rest of this season as he recovers from shoulder surgery, per a team announcement:
Portland center Ed Davis will undergo arthroscopic surgery on his left shoulder to repair an injured labrum, it was announced today by Neil Olshey, Trail Blazers president of basketball operations.
The procedure is scheduled to be performed next Tuesday by Dr. Neal ElAttrache at the Kerlan-Jobe Orthopaedic Clinic in Los Angeles.
A specific prognosis will be determined for Davis following the procedure, but he is expected to be out for the remainder of the 2016-2017 season.
Davis originally injured the shoulder during the 2015-16 season and has progressively worsened.
Um, so, yeah. The “progressively worsened” verbiage here is not good. And for those who deign to believe Davis isn’t a big loss for the Blazers, you need to reconsider.
Portland, for starters, is already playing without Evan Turner. Davis’ injury bilks the team of its three best defenders when you consider Mason Plumlee is now jumping center for the Nuggets. He is one of four active Blazers making above-average contributions per 100 possessions on the less glamorous end, according to Basketball-Reference’s Box Plus-Minus.
Granted, the Blazers’ defense is a collective sieve when he’s in the game, per NBA.com. But that’s an occupational hazard when you play substantial minutes for one of the league’s five worst fortress’; Davis was often surrounded by three or more defensive liabilities and tasked with guarding 4s when he’s a 5. The Blazers need his versatility on tap, if only to calk some of their minor leaks.
Which isn’t to say a healthy Davis would be the difference between a playoff berth and lottery appearance. But with the Blazers three games off the Western Conference’s No. 8 seed, losing one of their most important defensive pieces is far from ideal, and borders on damning.
