When Trajan Langdon was evaluating players in his first summer as team president of the Detroit Pistons, one thing he looked at closely was their injury history.
After being the GM of a team built around Zion Williamson and Brandon Ingram, two players who are always hurt, Langdon clearly made availability a priority and it has paid off for the Pistons, as they’ve managed to keep their injury report short for most of the season.
But now Tim Hardaway Jr. will join Jaden Ivey in a walking boot after injuring his ankle last night against Dallas and having to leave the game in the second quarter.
There still hasn’t been an update on the severity of the injury, though it was reported by the Dallas Morning News that THJ war spotted in a walking boot, which really doesn’t mean anything other than the medical team was trying to keep his leg stable.
Hopefully this will be a minor sprain that won’t keep THJ out for too long, as an injury to anyone will be a real blow to the Detroit Pistons.
The Pistons rotation and depth
Detroit isn’t an incredibly deep team, so any injury to a starter is going to have a ripple effect on everyone else.
We saw it last night when both Malik Beasley and Dennis Schroder were forced into more minutes than they usually play.
I wrote recently about how JB Bickerstaff established clear roles for his players that he has stuck with all season, so with everyone having to step up, those roles will be disrupted.
I wouldn’t be shocked to see coach Bickerstaff use Marcus Sasser as a starter if THJ has to miss much time, as that would at least keep everyone else in their familiar role in which they’ve thrived all season.
The Pistons schedule
Talk about bad timing.
The Pistons are getting ready to enter the final 11 games of their schedule, eight of which are against teams headed to the playoffs, including conference leaders OKC and Cleveland to go along with Minnesota, Memphis, Sacramento, New York and Milwaukee (x2), not an opportune time to have to absorb an injury to a starter.
The good news is that the Pistons have embraced a next man up mentality all season and will rally around their injured teammate just as they did when Jaden Ivey went down with a broken leg.
But there’s no doubt that this will have an effect, as THJ, Tobias Harris and Malik Beasley have been guys JB Bickerstaff could pencil into the lineup every night, the stabilizers who have been a big part of this team’s culture and success.
It’s unfortunate for THJ, who was honored by Dallas before the game, as well as the Pistons, whose roster depth is about to get a big test.