Los Angeles Clippers star Kawhi Leonard missed the final eight games of the postseason with a right knee injury. Leonard suffered the injury in Game 4 of the second-round series against the Utah Jazz and then missed the final two games of that series plus the entire Western Conference Finals.
Leonard had initially said he was okay after suffering the injury, only to not play again the rest of the playoffs. Just how bad this injury is remans shrouded in mystery as he approaches the offseason and a decision on his $36 million player option.
There were reports that Leonard had suffered an ACL injury, but it was never divulged just how serious it was. And now with the season over, Andrew Greif of the Los Angeles Times acknowledges that it's still not publicly known how severe the injury is. The Clippers never totally ruled Leonard out of the playoffs, but it seemed like there was a decent chance he wouldn't have been able to play in the NBA Finals if they had made it.
Leonard hasn't talked to the media since that press conference after initially suffering the injury, and it's unclear if he'll address the injury anytime soon. One would have to think if it was a truly bad injury more information would have come out by now, but it's hard to speculate too much.
This obviously isn't the first time there has been a lot of mystery surrounding Leonard's health. The whole saga with his quad injury helped drive him away from the San Antonio Spurs, and the whole load management thing has been a talking point for years now.
What this means for Leonard's offseason remains to be seen, though the guess is it probably doesn't mean much. The assumption is he's sticking with the Clippers, but even if he looks elsewhere, he's so good that other teams will still line up to get him even with the injury questions.
Still, it makes the situation all that more mysterious.
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