A hurt Klay Thompson was aching to go back to action, making a heroic return from the bowels of Oracle Arena to shoot the two free throws that would allow him to come back to the game if he was deemed a go. He wasn't. Yet all the Golden State Warriors swingman worried about was the potential that he could see the court again for his team.
“I was so hurt for him,” his father Mychal told ESPN's Ramona Shelburne. “He wanted to be out there with his teammates. If he was going to lose, he was going to go down with his teammates.”
Public relations VP Raymond Ridder noted Thompson's first words upon finding out he was out for the remainder of the game was considering whether he'd be fit to play a potential Game 7.
“I was back there when they told him he was out the rest of Thursday,” Ridder said. “And all he said was, ‘Do you think I can play Sunday [in Game 7]?'”
The Warriors had quickly seen their title chances reduce that much more — first with Kevin Durant's torn Achilles, now with Thompson's ACL injury, one he would not recover from.
Thompson has been a true iron man of the postseason, playing in 119 straight playoff games before missing his first in Game 3 of the NBA Finals.
Yet this is one injury he simply couldn't will himself to work through, as it will likely take him around eight months to fully recover from it.
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