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Portland Trail Blazers' Center Suffers Another Injury Setback; Report
The Portland Trail Blazers are going through a transition but it keeps on getting hampered by consistent injuries to their key players.
The Trail Blazers released a press release announcing that Robert Williams III had been diagnosed with a Grade 1 left hamstring strain. The team says the 26-year-old big man will get a second assessment in roughly two weeks.
Williams is disappointed by this development, as he has experienced numerous injuries during his NBA career. In six years, he has only twice participated in more than 35 regular-season games. When healthy, he has made a big contribution to the team, though, and in 2022 Boston selected him for the All-Defensive second team.
Williams was expected to be ready for the 2024–25 season to begin, having recently participated in five-on-five scrimmages following knee surgery last fall that ended his season early and restricted him to just six appearances in 2023–24. He participated fully in practice on Tuesday, but it appears that's when the hamstring injury happened because he missed Wednesday's session due to soreness.
Due to his most recent injury, Williams will miss the remainder of training camp and most likely Portland's three preseason games, the last of which is scheduled for October 18, precisely two weeks from Friday. That wouldn't normally be a huge deal because the regular season is what matters most, but even in the best-case scenario, soft-tissue injuries can still cause problems, and Williams hasn't participated in a game in 11 months.
It is unclear how long Williams will be out of the 2024–25 regular season. The Blazers' season begins on October 23 and continues for six more games through November 2, or roughly four weeks from now. The team will likely want to err on the side of caution after how much time he’s missed the past couple of seasons.
Rookie lottery pick Donovan Clingan is the most likely choice to play backup center if Williams does miss a few games during the regular season. Williams, the 27th overall selection in the 2018 draft, has two more seasons left on his deal. He will earn $12.4 million in 2024–2025 and $13.3 million in 2025–2026 before becoming a free agent.
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