NBA pushes back on idea that the league schedule is at heart of increased soft tissue injuries

Saturday in Las Vegas, it appears likely Victor Wembanyama will make his return to the court after missing a dozen games due to a calf strain. If it feels like there have been more calf strains — Giannis Antetokounmpo, Ja Morant, Jrue Holiday, Isaiah Hartenstein, Ty Jerome, Ben Sheppard — it’s because there have been. Tom Haberstroh broke down the numbers at Yahoo Sports, working with Jeff Stotts of In Street Clothes.

In the first 20 games of the 2025-26 season, we’ve seen a substantial increase in calf injuries (excluding contusions caused by blunt force), according to leading injury expert Jeff Stotts of InStreetClothes.com. This time last season, there were 18 calf injuries at the 20-game mark. This season, it’s up to 25 incidents, representing an increase of nearly 40%.

Advertisement

More significant, however, is the elongated recovery timeline of these injuries. Per Stotts’ data, the number of games lost due to calf injuries, through 20 games played, skyrocketed from 36 to 108. A tripling of last season’s total.

A little more than a week ago, John Holinger of The Athletic (formerly part of the Memphis front office) asked whether the strains of the NBA Cup schedule had exacerbated the rise in soft-tissue injuries. While that has been a topic discussed in league circles, the article largely flew under the radar — until Thursday, when the NBA released a lengthy statement pushing back on the premise of Hollinger’s article, with NBA spokesman Mike Bass’ name attached.

“John Hollinger’s premise that the NBA Cup has led to a denser schedule resulting in more player injuries is simply not supported by the data. Hollinger wonders if ‘the league turned the early-season travel dial a little too high’ and posits that teams are facing ‘an unnaturally heavy schedule cycle.’ The reality is the NBA played roughly the same number of games through 42 days this season (308) as last season (307).

“Further, those numbers are consistent with pre-Cup years (308 games in 2022 and 313 games in 2021). The Cup has objectively not led to a denser league-wide schedule in the early part of the season.

Advertisement

“Hollinger…

Source link : https://sports.yahoo.com/articles/nba-pushes-back-idea-league-221455038.html

Author :

Publish date : 2025-12-11 22:14:00

Copyright for syndicated content belongs to the linked Source.