'GREAT RANDOMIZER' IN SPORTS

Injuries.

You can’t plan for them, and yet in today’s NBA, you must. In an NBA world that has changed rapidly from where it was two decades ago, I’d argue this change is among the biggest.

Night to night, week to week, injuries are the league’s Great Randomizer. Notably, twice in the last two weeks, I’ve heard people in high places in the basketball world say the quiet part out loud: You can have all your plans and processes and whatever, and if the injury gremlins decide to visit, none of it matters.

After Game 4 of the WNBA Finals assured the series would go at least six games, I asked Golden State Valkyries coach Natalie Nakase about the keys to a long series, expecting to hear something about adjustments and X’s and O’s.

“As boring as it sounds, just staying healthy,” she said, and then immediately referenced her time in the NBA with a laugh. “I was with the Clippers.” (Nakase spent a decade in the organization from 2012-22.)

That part has certainly played out in the last few NBA postseasons, from the Achilles injuries to Jayson Tatum and Tyrese Haliburton in 2025 to Jalen Williams’ hamstring and De’Aaron Fox’s ankle in 2026.

It’s not like it’s just the last two years either, as both Nakase and I can tell you from experience. As you may know, I was vice president of basketball operations for the Memphis Grizzlies from 2012-19. The 2013 run to the Western Conference finals was wind-aided by injuries to Griffin and the Oklahoma City Thunder’s Russell Westbrook. Two years later, our best team of that era played Game 1 of the second round with our third-string point guard and lost Tony Allen for all but 21 minutes of the final three.

But 2013 was a more innocent time; the phenomenon has only accelerated from there.

In a related story, mere days after Nakase’s comment, I went to Oklahoma City and witnessed depredations of the injury gods first-hand when Jalen Williams suffered a likely season-ending injury against the Clippers.

The next day, Thunder GM Sam Presti admitted to the press what everyone in the league knows, but few people say: Luck with health is a much bigger factor than we’d like to admit, for both good and bad.

“I mean, anybody that has sat in this chair will tell you that so many things that happen that are out of your control,” Presti said. “That also means the good things. You know, when good things happen, it’s not like you’re pressing the buttons for that. There’s a lot of good fortune.

- Author: John Hollinger, The Athletic/NYT

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