ESPN's Jay Williams is amongst the pundits under the belief Kevin Durant was initially misdiagnosed for the injury that ultimately sidelined him for 32 days, one the Golden State Warriors deemed a “mild” calf strain after his MRI result.
“Ultimately I think this falls on the Golden State Warriors. I think he got misdiagnosed,” said Williams on Thursday's iteration of ESPN's Get Up. “I know for a fact that he was told that with a partially-torn calf that it unloaded the pressure on the Achilles — that there was no way that he could injure the Achilles, at all.
“For that to happen in the first half of a ball game, I can't even fathom that — because watching it I got ignited, I got pissed off — because that was what you go into the game thinking isn't gonna happen.”
Williams went on to criticize the way the Warriors have handled this as “horrific” from a public relations' standpoint.
“Their camp knew that he wasn't going to play until Game 5, Game 6. It was set from the beginning,” said Williams. “The Warriors didn't come out and say that, they said potentially — even throughout the Portland series — ‘he can come back.' Game 2, Game 3, ‘he can come back.'”
The Warriors chose to play this as a game-to-game ordeal in hopes to get some sort of competitive advantage by making teams game plan for scenarios in which the Warriors could have Durant back, but it ultimately ended up exasperating the fans and the media, as a 7-10 day injury turned into a month-long crusade.
It's worth noting Williams is a close friend of Durant's and one that has joined him several times in his ESPN series “The Boardroom.”
To say he was misdiagnosed is a far jump, even for Williams, unless he can report the actual diagnosis he believes to be correct.
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