entire season

Could Achilles injuries be the Achilles heel of the NBA?

Regardless of allegiance, anyone watching Game 7 of the NBA Finals on Sunday had to be struck by the calamitous impact of the injury to superstar Tyrese Haliburton on the Indiana Pacers.

Haliburton had the ball in the first quarter, took a step backward and began to go left. Pushing off with his right foot, the right tendon tore, and the Pacers chances of defeating the Oklahoma City Thunder were shredded.

“In that moment, my heart dropped for him,” OKC guard and Finals MVP Shai Gilgeous-Alexander told reporters. “I couldn’t imagine playing the biggest game of my life and something like that happening. It’s not fair.”

It’s also not uncommon. Haliburton was the third superstar lost during the playoffs to an Achilles tear, following Damian Lillard of the Milwaukee Bucks and Jayson Tatum of the Boston Celtics.

Players who sustained the injury during the regular season include Dejounte Murray of the New Orleans Pelicans, Dru Smith of the Miami Heat and two of Haliburton’s Indiana teammates — Isaiah Jackson and James Wiseman.

Regenerative medicine doctor Jesse Morse pointed out in X posts that the high-grade calf strain Haliburton suffered in Game 5 was a precursor to the Achilles injury.

“Hailburton was playing with fire by playing in Games 6 and 7 after being diagnosed with a high-grade calf strain, an injury that is notoriously slow to heal,” Morse wrote. “There was a significantly increased risk of a possible Achilles tear due to him already having the high-grade calf strain, regardless of what the ‘data shows.’

“We saw it with Kobe Bryant. We saw it with Aaron Rodgers. Likely more. A calf strain lead to an Achilles tear.”

Bryant ruptured his left Achilles on April 12, 2013, after playing every minute of eight consecutive quarters as the Lakers pursued a playoff spot with two games remaining in the regular season. Bryant had suffered injuries to his knees earlier in the game. He returned to action eight months later.

Rodgers tore his left Achilles in his first game as quarterback of the New York Jets on Sept. 11, 2023, shortly after he’d experienced tightness in his calf. He missed the entire season but returned in 2024 at age 41.

The Achilles tendon is a fibrous cord that directs movement from the leg to the foot, connecting muscles from the calf to the heel bone. A sudden explosive movement like running or jumping can cause the tendon to tear or rupture.

The origin of term Achilles stems from the hero of that name in Greek mythology. His mother sought to make him immortal by dipping him into a river that held magical powers. She held him by the heel, however, leaving it vulnerable.

Sure enough, the seemingly eternally brave Achilles was killed by an arrow to his heel during the Trojan War. The Achilles’ heel has been known ever since as a metaphor for a person’s vulnerable spot.

Haliburton certainly displayed a knack for heroics all season, culminating in the jump shot he made with 0.3 seconds to play in Game 1 of the Finals that gave the Pacers a victory over the heavily favored Thunder.

He helped them to reach Game 7 and hit a trio of three-point shots early in the contest only to — alas — crumple to the floor when his Achilles tendon popped. The Thunder prevailed, 103-91.

“We needed Ty out there,” Pacers forward Obi Toppin told reporters. “For him to go down in a game like that, that sucked the soul out of us.”

Like pretty much every other time the Dodgers have found themselves in a self-made mess, the task of downplaying a major problem once again was made the responsibility of manager Dave Roberts.

So, in the aftermath of a deflating 11-1 defeat by the Oakland Athletics on Tuesday night, Roberts trudged into the interview room at Dodger Stadium and applied a good old Stan Kasten spin to Roki Sasaki’s move to the 15-day injured list.

The point relayed by Roberts was basically this: Sasaki underwhelmed in his eight major league starts because of a shoulder pain that he kept secret from the Dodgers “for the last weeks,” and not because the 23-year-old rookie right-hander wasn’t as good as they previously thought.

“He hasn’t been as productive as he would have liked because he was compromised,” said Roberts, who added that Sasaki revealed his condition to the team after his most recent start.

The explanation raised an equally alarming possibility, however.

If Roberts’ story was accurate, and Sasaki experienced a shoulder impingement to the one that slowed him down last year in Japan, wouldn’t that point to a chronic problem?

As it was, Sasaki was already viewed as a high injury risk. He never remained healthy for an entire season with the Chiba Lotte Marines.

At this point, what’s worse? That Sasaki’s lack of control and decline in fastball velocity were because of a chronic shoulder issue? Or because he just was too raw to compete in the major leagues?

Either scenario would be problematic.

So, what now?

As much as the Dodgers sold Sasaki on how they could one day guide him to a Cy Young Award, his future isn’t their only priority. They also have to consider what’s best for their team, which is positioned to become baseball’s first repeat champion in a quarter century.

Even if the Dodgers acknowledge that Sasaki is more of a long-term project than a short-term solution and want to send him to the minor leagues when he returns, they might not have the luxury of doing so. They have signed four potential frontline pitchers in the last two years, and three of them are currently on the injured list — Sasaki, Blake Snell and Tyler Glasnow. The other, two-way player Shohei Ohtani, isn’t expected to pitch until after the All-Star break.

Snell was examined by a team doctor on Tuesday but the team didn’t provide any details about his condition. Glasnow played catch but Roberts didn’t provide a timeline for his return.

The rotation is in such a state of ruin that not only were the Dodgers forced to start Landon Knack on Tuesday, they were desperately awaiting the return of 37-year-old Clayton Kershaw four days later.

Roberts described Sasaki’s injury as “benign” but didn’t say when he might resume throwing. The manager insisted there were no thoughts of sending him to the minors, despite Sasaki posting a 4.72 earned-run average and completing six innings in just one start.

“I think our goal is to get him healthy, get him strong, make sure his delivery is sound for him to pitch for us,” Roberts said.

In other words, Sasaki will return to the mound in the major leagues. He will have to gain familiarity with low-quality American baseballs in the major leagues. He will have to become more comfortable with the pitch clock in the major leagues. He will have to strengthen his body to prevent future injuries in the major leagues. He will have to learn to throw something other than a fastball, forkball and slider in the major leagues.

The Dodgers knew Sasaki would require an adjustment period but they couldn’t have imagined anything this drastic.

The introductory news conference they staged for Sasaki in January was matched in scale in recent years only by Ohtani’s and Yoshinobu Yamamoto’s. That was where president of baseball operations Andrew Friedman declared Sasaki would start the season in the Dodgers’ rotation and general manager Brandon Gomes compared him to Paul Skenes of the Pittsburgh Pirates.

Back then, the Dodgers’ plan for Sasaki was simple: Insert him into the rotation and watch him develop into one of the best pitchers in baseball.

Sasaki can still become everything the Dodgers envisioned, but his path to greatness has become infinitely more complicated. Roberts remained characteristically upbeat, saying Sasaki concealed his shoulder problems from the team not because he was selfish but because he didn’t want to let down an injury-ravaged team.

“He’s a great teammate,” Roberts said.

With his rotation crumbling, Roberts didn’t have the luxury of viewing the situation any other way.