Indiana Pacers center Myles Turner had a loved battle coronavirus (COVID-19), with his father David hospitalized due to the pandemic-level virus.
Turner spoke to Portland Trail Blazers shooting guard and podcaster CJ McCollum on his show and detailed the challenging time his family faced due to the infectious disease.
“My dad actually got it. He made a full recovery. But just seeing him kind of go through it was huge, because you see all the memes, and it’s funny and stuff on Twitter until something actually happens to you,” the Pacers big man shared, via Dan Feldman of NBC Sports. “And seeing my dad get it, he was super weak. He could barely talk. My dad has underlying conditions as well. He’s 55, 56 years old. So, he has underlying conditions. And he was in the hospital for damn near a week, maybe six or seven days.
“I think that’s when I kind of started taking it more serious. Like, man, this can really happen to anybody. We don’t know much about it. And that’s when I started doing more research on it, keeping up on it every day to see what I can do to keep myself safe, my sister safe, keep my family safe. Blessed as it may be, he made a full recovery. He’s not contagious any more. He’s back on his feet. It’s a blessing that he was able to make it through, but there’s a lot of people that aren’t. So, I think having something personal happen to you like that, that’s kind of what made it, the perspective, all feel real.”
No one on the Pacers was identified having contracted the coronavirus, but players' friends and families have been sidelined with the awful virus. Minnesota Timberwolves star center Karl-Anthony Towns, for example, saw his mother hospitalized in the intensive care unit due to trouble breathing while struggling with COVID-19.
The NBA suspended the 2019-20 season indefinitely last March 12 after Rudy Gobert became the first player to test positive for the coronavirus. Currently, there are concerns about how to get the league back as the pandemic continues to worsen.
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