Paul George is still one of the leading candidates for the NBA's Most Valuable Player Award. His two-way play for the Oklahoma City Thunder has been superlative, and he has helped OKC stay in the top three in the Western Conference standings for most of the season.

But since George went down with a shoulder injury at the end of February and missed the next three games, something has not seemed quite right with the All-Star shooting guard.

In his last four games, George is shooting a combined 22-72 from the field (just over 30 percent) and 8-35 from beyond the arc (just under 23 percent) as the team has gone 2-2 in that stretch.

When Thunder head coach Billy Donovan was asked if George is experiencing any lingering effects from the injury, he gave a very, very concise answer.

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Despite Billy Donovan's insistence that Paul George is healthy, something may be awry. After all, he had been shooting better than 45 percent from the field and over 30 percent from deep from December to February. Granted, that three-month period of scoring and efficiency were eye-popping to say the least, but they had seemed to become the norm for the All-Star small forward.

The Thunder can ill afford any more setbacks from George. They lost two of the three games in which he was out, and have since lost their spot in the top three behind another big surge from the Houston Rockets.

Currently, the Thunder are not only a game back of Houston but also have an identical record with the Portland Trail Blazers. If they hope to climb back into the top three or even avoid slipping to the fifth seed in the West, they need George at his very best.