The Whiteboard: Injuries will impact NBA Playoffs more than ever

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It’s a pretty basic concept: In the NBA (or any sport, for that matter), you need your best players to be healthy to win it all. This is nothing new, and it’s the reason it takes a little bit of luck to win a championship in any given year.

But with the 2021 NBA Playoffs on the horizon, and a number of contenders struggling to get right during this stretch run, it’s becoming more and more apparent how much health will have an even greater impact on this year’s title race than in seasons past.

This rash of injuries around the league isn’t surprising, of course. When the 2019-20 season was put on hold by the coronavirus pandemic for four-and-a-half months, nobody knew what would follow: eight seeding games for all 22 teams invited to the Orlando bubble, then the “regular” playoff grind in a confined space, then an incredibly brief offseason that lasted two months before a 72-game season followed suit. Aside from the obvious mental and emotional tolls of the pandemic, racial reckoning in America and living in a bubble for 2-3 months, that level of physical exertion took an extreme toll as well, and we’ve been seeing the unfortunate results all season.

A simple look at last year’s conference finalists shows an alarming trend. The defending champion Los Angeles Lakers are in danger of landing in a play-in spot thanks to Anthony Davis’ calf strain and LeBron James’ high ankle sprain, which he just re-aggravated in his long-awaited return. AD has been injury-prone for years, but even at 36 years old, it’s been stunning to watch a human cyborg like James miss the longest stretch of his career due to injury.

The fourth-place Denver Nuggets have dealt with injury woes all year, and their title prospects dimmed significantly when Jamal Murray was lost for the season to an ACL tear. Will Barton is also out for the foreseeable future with a hamstring injury.

In the East, the sixth-place Miami Heat haven’t gotten right all season, missing players left and right due to injuries and COVID-19 health and safety protocols. The same can be said for the seventh-place Boston Celtics, who have missed Kemba Walker for big stretches and are currently dealing with a day-to-day ankle injury for Jaylen Brown.

And those are just the contenders! Other playoff-caliber teams have seen their ceilings stunted for similar reasons. The Portland Trail Blazers should feel fortunate to even be in seventh place out West with all the time CJ McCollum and Jusuf Nurkic have missed. The Dallas Mavericks are trying to stay afloat despite Kristaps Porzingis’ lingering knee issues. And who could forget how the Golden State Warriors are out of the title conversation completely with Klay Thompson sidelined for yet another whole season?

In terms of this year’s playoffs, however, we can’t ignore that last year’s conference finalists — the Lakers (179 games), Nuggets (172 games), Heat (220 games) and Celtics (193 games) — have all experienced a high number of cumulative missed games due to injury, health and safety protocols, rest or personal reasons. Thanks to incredible roster construction and the sheer firepower of having Kevin Durant, James Harden and Kyrie Irving on the same team, the Brooklyn Nets have managed to overcome a whopping 244 cumulative missed games due to injury. The LA Clippers haven’t hit their full stride in the West with 151 missed games.

The Phoenix Suns (112 games), Utah Jazz (118 games) and Philadelphia 76ers (113 games) have all proven themselves as legitimate title contenders, but their place at the top of their respective conference standings also reflects how much healthier they’ve been compared to the rest of the league.

The team with the fewest cumulative missed games due to injury — the Milwaukee Bucks, at 92 — would be in that same boat if not for the acclimation period of integrating major new pieces from the offseason, and even they are experiencing higher injury rates than normal. For reference, there were seven NBA teams with fewer missed games last year than this year’s Bucks team, and that was with all 30 teams playing in as many (or more) games as teams have so far this year.

The totality of games missed doesn’t tell the full picture, of course, since not all missed games are created equal. The Lakers have missed their two best players for major chunks of the season, dropping them to sixth in the West, and now they need to win games to avoid the play-in tournament. The problem is trying to find the balance between winning enough to avoid a do-or-die play-in scenario while AD is still shaking off rust, Dennis Schroder is out 10-14 days due to health and safety protocols, and LA is trying to get LeBron healthy enough for another Finals run.

The Nuggets will be without their second-best player for the postseason. The Clippers just got Patrick Beverley back, but Serge Ibaka — who hasn’t played since March 14 — is still dealing with back tightness. The Nets have no idea when James Harden will be back, and Kevin Durant has been made of glass this season. Even the Jazz, who have been relatively unscathed on this front, are currently awaiting the returns of Donovan Mitchell (ankle) and Mike Conley (hamstring). Fanbases in Philly (Joel Embiid) and Phoenix (Chris Paul) will be watching with bated breath, hoping their injury-prone stars beat the odds and stay healthy.

The playoffs start in 17 days, and even if all these prominent names return in time, that still doesn’t give these contenders much time to ramp up their work load, shake off potential rust and re-establish chemistry with teammates who have had to adjust their playing styles in their absences. More than ever before, in such a wide-open season where as many as 8-10 teams have a legitimate shot at a title, it pays to be a healthy contender with continuity as much as it does to be a great team with championship-level talent.

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On a related note, if you’re wondering how worried the Lakers should be about LeBron James, ESPN’s Kevin Pelton has you covered (subscription required).

De’Anthony Melton’s improvements as a shooter and ball-handler in year three, when paired with his stout defense, make him invaluable to the Grizzlies.