Sunday night's matchup between the Sacramento Kings and the Memphis Grizzlies involved a bit of a heated moment between Chimezie Metu and Jonas Valanciunas. The (semi/almost) altercation ultimately led to Metu suffering a broken wrist in a play that has been called out by Sacramento head coach Luke Walton.
Metu poesterized Valanciunas late in the game, and he hovered over the Grizzlies big man for a bit after the highlight-reel dunk. Valanciunas did not appreciate Metu's antics (although it looked like Metu really didn't have any choice) and decided to throw down the 23-year-old to the ground. Here's a look at the play:
Valanciunas wasn't having it after Metu dunked on him. pic.twitter.com/ET2b2JSgPr
— SportsCenter (@SportsCenter) February 15, 2021
Unfortunately, Metu sustained a broken wrist after using his hand to break his fall. According to Jason Anderson of The Sacramento Bee, Metu will now be forced to miss “several weeks” because of the injury.
Coach Walton was clearly unhappy with how the play developed, and he even thought that Valanciunas should have been whistled for a flagrant foul for his excessive action. Walton called it a “dangerous play,” which true enough, resulted in a significant injury for Metu.
Metu hasn't exactly been the most important player in Sacramento's rotation so far this season (he's averaging just 6.5 minutes per game) and it's not as if the Kings will be at a complete loss without him. That's not the point here, though.
Valanciunas clearly put an effort in trying to take down Metu in what seemed like a heat-of-the-moment type of reaction. He probably didn't expect Metu to fall that badly and it even looked like Valanciunas tried to pull him back at the last second. Be that as it may, the damage has been done. We'd be surprised if the league took action here against JV, though.
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