Oklahoma City Thunder/NBA(OKLAHOMA CITY) — Thunder All-Star Kevin Durant will be out six to eight weeks with a Jones fracture in his foot, the team announced on Sunday.
Durant noticed the pain in his foot and notified the team after practice on Saturday.
There is no official timetable for the reigning MVP, but general manager Sam Presti said that he will do his best to improve the team while Durant is sidelined.
“In regard to replacing a player like Kevin Durant, you don’t replace Kevin Durant. It’s not going to be one person. It’s going to be a collective mindset,” Presti said. “We know we’re a better basketball team with Kevin Durant on the floor. But we can have some influence on how good we are in the meantime. We’re certainly not going to be looking at the calendar waiting for him to get back. I don’t think he’d want us to do that.”
Presti said that it’s a good thing that Durant let the team know now instead of starting the regular season with the fracture.
“Because it’s a stress injury, it happened over time,” Presti said. “The fact that Kevin mentioned it when he did is a real fortunate piece of this because if he had continued to play on it, it would continue to get worse. So that it was identified when it was identified, and that the pain, or achiness, was enough to mention it, is a positive.”
Durant averaged 32 points, 7.4 rebounds and 5.5 assists in 81 games last season and has played the most minutes in the league since 2007.
“Coming in to this season having not played USA Basketball, reflecting on that decision now, I think clearly, probably helped him a great deal, just the amount of stress he was able to avoid at that point in time,” Presti said. “I think that brought him back in to camp in a good spot.”
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