Jalen Williams Going Into Full Detail Around His Wrist Injury Makes His Championship Playoff Run Even More Impressive

Zach Beeker. Getty Images.

One thing I've always had immense respect for is that once the NHL playoffs are over or a team gets eliminated, we as fans get some clarification as to just how injured these dudes were. You see "lower leg injury" while the games are going on, and then after the series, you learn well in reality that player tore every single ligament in their entire leg. A "chest" injury is actually like 8 broken ribs, a collapsed lung and a fractured sternum or some shit. As someone who wakes up sore after sleeping, what NHL players put themselves through all in the pursuit of the Cup is about as insane as it gets. 

In the NBA we get that, but not exactly to the same degree. For example, once the Celts were eliminated, it didn't take long to hear about how Jaylen actually had a torn meniscus the entire playoffs. Usually, those announcements come in defeat.

When it comes to the Champs, we got word that Jalen Williams actually had torn ligaments in his right wrist that he suffered before the playoffs. Playing on that type of injury for basically two months AND having a great playoff run/Finals performance? That's big time stuff. Only knowing that bit of information makes his performance impressive, but when he went into the details surrounding his injury? It's hard not to be wildly impressed

28-29 cortisone and lidocaine shots? The way he talked about how he was not going to let his injury be an excuse? The fact that he tried to revamp his entire jumpshot by not flicking his wrist while the playoffs were going on is crazy. To then think that on the biggest stage, he still went out and dropped a 40 piece? That performance was impressive enough on its own, but now knowing all of the details around it takes it up a few levels for me

That type of showing in the swing Game 5 of the series, you could make the case that the Thunder might not be sitting here as Champs had JDub not put up that type of performance.

It's also not surprising that he hid the injury so that it wouldn't become a target for their opponents. We saw in ORL/BOS how the Magic repeatedly tried to attack Tatum's wrist after he got hurt, as well as what we saw the Rockets/Dillon Brooks do with Steph Curry's thumb. If you have an injury/weakness, that becomes a target in playoff basketball. Call it dirty, call it gamesmanship, that's just the reality. Remember when OKC kept attacking Aaron Gordon off the bounce in that Game 7 because he had a Grade 2 hamstring strain and could barely move? Same idea. Keeping it under wraps so you don't give up a competitive advantage was probably the best decision he ever made.

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I also found it super interesting to hear a player be THAT OPEN and honest about the injury and what the hell happened. I feel like you never get that much detail and honesty surrounding major injuries and everything that happened in an attempt to play through it, so to get such an in-depth play by play as the Thunder navigated each series was fascinating. Hearing how bad it got during the Grizzlies series really puts it in perspective how crazy it is to then play 3 more rounds on a busted wrist. The way he broke down how the injury impacted his jumper, his release, and the feeling in his fingers was also cool to hear. 

It's a bit of a long video (15 minutes), but considering we almost never get this level of in-depth explanation from star players and their injuries, I'd say it's worth carving out some time for if you're interested in this sort of thing. I get it's the trendy thing to hate on the Thunder and whatever, but I don't really get it. They were historically dominant since Day 1 of the NBA season, they survived two separate Game 7s on the way to their title, and after listening to JDub in that video he doesn't seem all that hateable. Is it jealousy from opposing fanbases? Probably, but after watching that entire video it's hard for me to not have even more respect for the Thunder's journey up the mountain.