For the Oklahoma City Thunder, their 121-108 win on Saturday night over the Detroit Pistons was quite bittersweet. Although they improved to 29-20 with their seventh straight victory, the Thunder took a massive blow defensively going forward when they lost guard Andre Roberson to a season-ending injury.
Late in the third quarter against the Pistons at Little Caesars Arena, Roberson appeared to slip on a wet spot and tore his left patellar tendon in the process. He had to be stretchered out of the arena and taken to a local hospital in Detroit.
But just how big of a hit will Oklahoma City take with their defense? According to a tweet on Saturday night from Micah Adams of ESPN Stats & Info, there is a significant drop-off in defensive rating when Roberson is not on the floor.
Westbrook, George, Carmelo, Adams all on the floor together this season…
Def rating with Roberson: 96.6
Def rating without Roberson: 114.5One man causes a 4 man rotation to go from worst to first defensively.
Major blow to OKC defense.
— Micah Adams (@MicahAdams13) January 28, 2018
That is an amazing statistic, to say the least, and it will be quite an uphill battle for he Thunder with such a great defensive player in Roberson done for the year. After the game, OKC superstar point guard Russell Westbrook commented on what losing Roberson means for the team. According to Erik Horne from The Oklahoman, the reigning MVP said:
“A lot changes. A lot of things that’s not seen on the court. A lot of things that’s not seen on the stat sheet, and that’s a huge part. Like I always say, he’s a huge part of our team’s success, and obviously with him going down, we’ve gotta be able to forget it and make up for the things he brings to the game defensively and offensively.”
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