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Klay Thompson’s Injury No Cause For Alarm

By Gerald Bourguet

Mar 9, 2015; Phoenix, AZ, USA; Golden State Warriors guard Klay Thompson sticks out his tongue as he reacts in the second quarter against the Phoenix Suns at US Airways Center. Mandatory Credit: Mark J. Rebilas-USA TODAY Sports
Mar 9, 2015; Phoenix, AZ, USA; Golden State Warriors guard Klay Thompson sticks out his tongue as he reacts in the second quarter against the Phoenix Suns at US Airways Center. Mandatory Credit: Mark J. Rebilas-USA TODAY Sports /
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In the third quarter of the Golden State Warriors‘ narrow victory over the Los Angeles Lakers, Klay Thompson rolled his ankle on Tarik Black‘s foot. He hobbled around for a second, shot the free throws and finished the rest of the game.

Apparently the sprained right ankle is worse than we thought, because Thompson is expected to miss the next 7-10 days with the injury. Thompson played through the rest of the game — most likely on adrenaline — but the postgame swelling will cause him to miss at least a week of action.

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Injured ankles are never a good thing, especially for a team whose best player — Stephen Curry — already plays on surgically repaired ankles. But for the league-leading Warriors, Thompson’s injury is no cause for alarm just yet.

With a 53-13 record, the Dubs have won more than 80 percent of their games and hold a seven-game lead over the Memphis Grizzlies for the top seed in the West. With the Oklahoma City Thunder’s loss to the Dallas Mavericks on Monday, the Dubs have already locked up a playoff spot and are highly unlikely to lose their place atop the Western Conference standings.

In the next 7-10 days, the Dubs will take on the Atlanta Hawks, New Orleans Pelicans, Utah Jazz, Washington Wizards, Portland Trail Blazers and Memphis Grizzlies. That’s a brutal slate of opponents, but the first four come at home. The Warriors are a staggering 30-2 at Oracle Arena this season.

The Dubs may take their lumps with one Splash Brother out of the lineup, but Steve Kerr‘s team is pretty deep and well poised to absorb the blow of his absence.

In fact, Thompson sitting on the sidelines for awhile might actually strengthen the MVP case of Stephen Curry, even if Kerr has said that he won’t be riding his star point guard with Klay out:

It’s kind of silly how much stock we put into players carrying their shorthanded teams when it comes to the MVP race, but we rarely get to see what the Warriors look like without Klay Thompson. Not having Thompson hurts on both ends of the floor, but a Curry heat check is sometimes all it takes for the Dubs to turn a bad night around.

Golden State has been pretty healthy across the board this season (keep those fingers crossed!), but in each of the two games Thompson missed this year, the Warriors lost.

In the first game, however, the Dubs were on the road on the second night of a back-to-back against a Phoenix Suns team that was much better at the start of their season. In that contest, Curry didn’t exactly blow our hair back. He had 28 points and 10 assists, but he also committed 10 turnovers that helped the Suns get out and run.

The only other game Thompson has missed this season came against the Denver Nuggets last week when Kerr decided to rest the Splash Brothers, Andrew Bogut and Andre Iguodala.

In the two games the Dubs have played without Thompson this season, they’re 0-2. It’s tempting to read into that statistic, but that’s an extremely small sample size, and again, at this point in time the Warriors should really be focusing on preserving as much energy as possible for the postseason.

Even if the Warriors went 0-6 over the next 10 days without Thompson, the Memphis Grizzlies haven’t been playing tremendous basketball lately either. It’s highly unlikely the Grizz will grit-n-grind their way to the top of the standings, and even if they did, it wouldn’t be the end of the world. The Dubs would still have 10 games, most likely with Thompson at 100 percent, to snatch the No. 1 seed back.

And even if the Grizzlies did snag the No. 1 seed in this hypothetical worst-case scenario, is that really the end of the world? The only team that’s lost fewer road games than the Warriors (11) this season is the Atlanta Hawks (10). At full strength, the statistics support the Warriors being the best team in the NBA and it’s not even close.

In the meantime, Justin Holiday will likely start in Thompson’s place. You can also expect to see more minutes for Shaun Livingston, Leandro Barbosa, Andre Iguodala and possibly even Brandon Rush.

Weep for Thompson’s absence during tonight’s highly anticipated rematch between the conference leaders if you must, but until we get word on the severity of Thompson’s ankle sprain, there’s no reason to panic just yet.

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