Injury Notes: F. Wagner, Okongwu, Giddey, Kawamura, T. Johnson
Franz Wagner doesn’t appear close to returning from the left ankle injury that has kept him on the sidelines for 20 of the Magic‘s past 22 games, writes Jason Beede of The Orlando Sentinel. The fifth-year forward was limited to riding a stationary bike during Wednesday’s shootaround in Miami and was scheduled to do standstill shooting after his teammates left the court.
Wagner didn’t experience a setback after he returned for a pair of games earlier this month, according to Beede, who hears the 24-year-old likely hasn’t undergone recent imaging on the ankle. Instead, the soreness is viewed as a lingering effect of the original high ankle sprain he sustained on December 7.
The 24-year-old admitted this week he probably returned too early when he played a pair of contests in Europe against the Grizzlies, the first of which was the NBA’s first-ever regular season game in his home country of Germany. The game took place in Berlin, his home town.
“Definitely not where I want it to be to play, and to play consistently,” Wagner said Wednesday, per Beede. “It’s consistently (that) is the big thing. Obviously I really wanted to play in Berlin but probably wasn’t ready for that yet. So, yeah, tough situation just looking back but definitely still got a little bit to go.”
Wagner explained that he experienced the soreness after the second game in London, when he played 26 minutes in a loss, and continued to feel it days later, Beede notes. He will miss his fifth straight game on Friday and he’s not sure when he’ll be able to return.
“I’m learning that it’s one of those things that can linger a little bit,” Wagner said. “So, I just want to make sure that once I get back, I’m really back, and don’t have to sit out a game here and feel good again. I want to be good for the rest of the year.”
We have more injury-related updates from around the NBA:
- Hawks big man Onyeka Okongwu lost a couple of teeth when he was elbowed in the face by Jaylen Brown in the fourth quarter of Wednesday’s victory over Boston, relays Mike Vorkunov of The Athletic. Brown received a flagrant 1 foul for the play, though he said it wasn’t intentional. “Just being aggressive like I always am,” Brown told reporters. “Just a basketball play. It’s unfortunate. Okongwu is a good player. I know from my own experiences with a fractured face and chipped teeth, that (stuff) is a hassle. It wasn’t intentional, and I know it’s going to be a long day at the dentist tomorrow, so hopefully he has a good recovery.” Okongwu underwent a successful dental procedure in Atlanta on Thursday morning, per the Hawks (Twitter link). He was ruled out of Thursday’s loss to Houston and is considered day-to-day moving forward.
- Bulls guard Josh Giddey, who missed about three weeks due to a left hamstring strain before returning last week, experienced tightness in that hamstring in Wednesday’s loss at Indiana and was held out of Thursday’s loss to Miami, writes Joe Cowley of The Chicago Sun-Times. The original plan was for Giddey to play both ends of the back-to-back before the tightness occurred. “Because of the past injury they want to make sure they can clear the tightness up because I think they worry about it going from one thing to the next,” head coach Billy Donovan said. “I don’t know when he’ll return. There was no strain or a setback, anything like that. It’s just a matter of how long it will take them to remove the tightness where he could just play without it.”
- Second-year point guard Yuki Kawamura, whom the Bulls waived in October but re-signed to a two-way deal earlier this month, was grateful to be active for the first time this season on Thursday, Cowley adds. Kawamura has fully recovered from the blood clot in his lower right leg which prompted the team to release him. “Rehab wasn’t easy,” Kawamura said. “It was a long way. I found out I had a blood clot before the season started and I felt real bad because I was so super excited to play. I’m super happy to be here and to be back on the court.” At 5’7″, Kawamura is the shortest player in the NBA, but he’s confident in his ability to play in the league and the longtime Bulls fan is “super excited” to play for the team and its fans.
- Rookie guard Tre Johnson, the No. 6 overall pick in the 2025 draft, suffered a right ankle sprain in Thursday’s victory over Milwaukee and was ruled out for the remainder of the contest, the Wizards announced (via Twitter). Johnson played 11 minutes prior to the injury.
Nets May Make Offer For Giannis Antetokounmpo
Although the Nets clearly aren’t focused on winning games this season, they’ve long had their sights set on Giannis Antetokounmpo and their rebuild shouldn’t prevent them from making an offer for the Bucks superstar, says Brian Lewis of The New York Post (subscriber link). Multiple sources Lewis has spoken to said the Nets plan to be competitive in 2026/27.
“Then this is their moment,” one league source told The Post. “Really depends on if they decide that their aimless tank is over. They could sure make the best offer.”
As Lewis writes, “best” is a relative term and an ideal offer for Milwaukee depends on what the team is prioritizing. But the Nets certainly have a large stash of draft assets if they decide to pursue the two-time MVP.
On the latest edition of the Hoop Collective podcast (YouTube link), ESPN’s Brian Windhorst agreed that the Nets could be a suitor for Antetokounmpo, Lewis notes.
“Brooklyn has 10 tradable firsts, Michael Porter Jr. and 11 tradeable firsts as of draft night,” Windhorst said. “… I think Brooklyn will seriously consider making an offer.”
Lewis’ aforementioned source assumed Porter would be involved in an outgoing package for Giannis, but an assistant GM thought the 27-year-old forward would be more likely to stay in Brooklyn, speculating that Nic Claxton and Terance Mann would be included instead for salary-matching purposes.
“The Nets make a lot of sense for him,” one Eastern Conference assistant GM told Lewis. “They have some good future picks. [They] could, in theory, trade five future [first-round] picks, keep this year’s pick, shut him down for the year? Tank?“
Cavs’ De’Andre Hunter Likely To Be Traded?
After reporting on Wednesday that the Cavaliers‘ front office was hesitant to trade De’Andre Hunter for less than it gave up to acquire him a year ago (Caris LeVert, Georges Niang, three second-round picks, and two pick swaps), Brett Siegel of ClutchPoints now hears the veteran forward is likely to be moved prior to the February 5 deadline (Twitter links).
The Lakers and a “couple other” teams have been speaking to the Cavs about Hunter, league sources tell ClutchPoints. The Los Angeles Times previously cited Hunter as a possible Lakers target.
The Nets have emerged as a team willing to help facilitate a deal, according to Siegel, and L.A. has shown interest in Haywood Highsmith and Day’Ron Sharpe. Siegel doesn’t state it outright, but that construct implies Brooklyn would likely take on unwanted Lakers salaries in exchange for draft assets.
As Siegel writes, some members of Cleveland’s front office support the idea of moving off Hunter’s contract, with second-year Lakers forward Dalton Knecht heading back to Cleveland. That suggests the Cavaliers, who are the only NBA team over the second tax apron and are projected to have a massive luxury tax bill, view a potential deal as a salary dump.
Still, Siegel cautions that talks have been ongoing, so that three-team construct is merely one of multiple possibilities.
Hunter is converting a career-worst 30.9% of his three-point attempts this season after making a career-high 40.5% of his outside looks in 2024/25. For context, his career percentage is in the middle of those two figures (36.5%).
Hunter, 28, is owed $23.3MM in ’25/26 and $24.9MM in ’26/27. In 42 games this season, he has averaged 13.9 points, 4.3 rebounds and 2.1 assists in 26.2 minutes per contest.
Knicks Rumors: KAT, Giannis, Yabusele, Targets, Bridges
The Knicks reportedly spoke to the Bucks about a possible Giannis Antetokounmpo trade last offseason after the two-time MVP identified New York as a preferred landing spot, but those talks didn’t go anywhere. That could be partly because Karl-Anthony Towns was rumored to be the Knicks’ outgoing salary, and some people around the league don’t value the former No. 1 overall pick.
“I don’t think there is a [trade] market for KAT,” an NBA executive told Stefan Bondy of The New York Post (subscriber link). “Not that he is a bad player, but he’s not a winning player. … It’s too much money to spend on him.”
Knicks sources tell Sam Amick of The Athletic that the offseason trade talks involving the two big men created “hard feelings” between Towns and the front office that “remain to this day.”
For his part, Towns downplayed his name being involved in recent trade chatter, Bondy writes in another story. The five-time All-Star has known Leon Rose for years, as the Knicks’ president was Towns’ former agent at CAA, but they haven’t spoken about any of the speculation.
“I feel like I’ve been in trade rumors a lot for a lot of times, for a year damn near. That don’t matter to me,” said Towns, who was traded from the Timberwolves to the Knicks before last season. “I don’t look at social media or none of that stuff. I focus on the job on hand which is trying to get wins every single night. As long as I do that, I do my job, I go home happy and I feel accomplished. I’m not worried about what anybody got to say or people write or anything like that.”
Here are a few more rumors and notes from New York:
- According to Bondy, the Knicks remain highly interested in Antetokounmpo, but Milwaukee is reportedly looking for “blue-chip young talent” and several draft picks in any deal involving the nine-time All-NBA forward, and New York simply lacks the necessary assets to have a competitive bid compared to other teams, which control their future first-round picks. Unless Antetokounmpo specifically requests to be traded to the Knicks, they’re a “long shot” to land him, says Bondy. Of course, even if Giannis does prefer to play in New York, the Bucks aren’t obligated to fulfill the request. New York’s odds of landing Antetokounmpo would theoretically improve in the offseason, Bondy notes, when the team will have two first-round picks to trade, as opposed to the top-eight protected 2026 first-round pick the Knicks currently control from the Wizards that will likely turn into two second-rounders.
- The Knicks are still actively looking to unload Guerschon Yabusele‘s contract and have been talking to multiple teams about possible trades, Bondy reports (subscription required). Bondy continues to hear Pelicans guard Jose Alvarado is on the team’s radar, and confirms Yves Missi is as well. Kings guard Keon Ellis is another player who has fans in the Knicks organization, a source tells Bondy.
- Yabusele, a french forward/center, holds a $5.8MM player option for next season. When asked about the possibility of returning to the EuroLeague at some point, Yabusele didn’t rule it out but said his focus is on the NBA, per Toni Canyameras of Spanish outlet Mundo Deportivo (Twitter video link). “I feel like that’s a good question,” Yabusele said. “I definitely don’t know what tomorrow is going to be like or anything like that. But I never close my door on anything. Obviously it was so [difficult to make it back] to the NBA [that I’m focused on staying] in the NBA, but we will see what opportunities present themselves. There’s definitely going to be a conversation to have, and [we’ll] see what the [European options are]. We will see. I will never say never [to a potential return].”
- Veteran wing Mikal Bridges has been in a slump for most of the past month, but he torched the Raptors in Wednesday’s win at Toronto, finishing with 30 points on 12-of-15 shooting in 36 minutes. Bridges, a Philadelphia native who played college ball at Villanova, struggled in Saturday’s loss in Philly, scoring just nine points on 3-of-16 shooting. He said that game served as something of a wake-up call (Twitter video link via Knicks on MSG). “I think a lot of it comes from not just shooting the ball, I think I just wasn’t playing how I was supposed to be playing. I think I wasn’t coachable enough,” Bridges said. “I don’t know what it was. Maybe I felt too much entitlement. Just kinda had to talk to myself a little bit about it and just be coachable and be the best teammate I can be and let the basketball speak for itself.”
Austin Reaves Questionable To Play Friday For Lakers
Fifth-year guard Austin Reaves has been upgraded to questionable for Friday’s contest at Washington, the Lakers announced on their injury report (Twitter link via Brad Turner of The Los Angeles Times).
Reaves, who is expected to become a free agent this summer, has been out since December 25 after sustaining a Grade 2 left gastrocnemius strain. The gastrocnemius is the largest and most powerful muscle in the calf.
In 23 appearances this season (35.3 minutes per game), Reaves has averaged 26.6 points, 6.3 assists, 5.2 rebounds and 1.0 steal on .502/.365/.873 shooting. He has missed the Lakers’ last 17 games (23 overall).
Reaves suffered a mild left calf strain on December 8 and returned to action on December 23. He experienced soreness in his calf in his second game back, with an MRI later confirming the second strain. While they seem likely to be connected, Reaves’ initial strain was reportedly to a different part of his calf, which is also comprised of the soleus and plantaris muscles.
Head coach JJ Redick announced a couple weeks ago that Reaves was “progressing well” from his injury and on track to return at some point on the Lakers’ eight-game road trip.
Los Angeles has gone 15-8 with Reaves in the lineup this season, vs. a 13-10 mark without him. The 27-year-old has some of the best on/off figures on the Lakers, though it’s a fairly small sample size since he’s missed half of the team’s games.
Star guard Luka Doncic, who slipped off the sidelines of the Cavaliers’ raised court in Wednesday’s blowout loss in Cleveland, is also questionable Friday due to left ankle soreness.
Aaron Gordon Out At Least 4-6 Weeks With Hamstring Strain
Nuggets forward Aaron Gordon will be reevaluated in four-to-six weeks due to a right hamstring strain, reports Shams Charania of ESPN (Twitter link).
Bennett Durando of The Denver Post confirms the news (via Twitter).
Gordon, a key starter for the Nuggets, aggravated his right hamstring strain in a January 23 victory at Milwaukee. The team was cautiously optimistic his latest strain wasn’t severe as his first, which sidelined him for six weeks, but it appears he’ll end up facing a similar recovery timeline.
In 23 appearances this season, Gordon has averaged 17.7 points, 6.2 rebounds and 2.5 assists in 27.9 minutes per game, with a strong shooting slash line of .509/.400/.789. The 30-year-old is also one of the best defenders on Denver’s roster.
The Nuggets have a 17-6 record when Gordon plays this season, compared to a 14-10 mark when he’s unavailable. They’re currently 31-16, the No. 3 seed in the Western Conference.
While Denver will be without Gordon for several weeks — likely for all of February — they should have superstar center Nikola Jokic back in the near future. Charania reported on Tuesday that the three-time MVP, who has been out for a month due to a hyperextended left knee and bone bruise, is expected to be reevaluated next week.
Blazers’ Duop Reath Out For Season Following Foot Surgery
Duop Reath underwent surgery on Thursday morning to repair a stress fracture in his right foot, according to the Trail Blazers, who announced (via Twitter) that the third-year center will miss the remainder of the 2025/26 season.
Reath is expected to make a full recovery, the team added.
It’s a tough blow for the 29-year-old, who will be a restricted free agent this summer if he’s tendered a qualifying offer. Although that QO is worth a fairly modest $3MM, it certainly doesn’t seem like a lock that Reath will receive it, given the limited role he’s played the past two seasons.
Reath, who went undrafted in 2018 out of LSU and spent several years overseas before catching on with Portland in October 2023, was a rotation regular for the Blazers as a rookie in 2023/24, averaging 9.1 points and 3.7 rebounds while shooting 35.9% from three-point range in 68 appearances (17.9 minutes per game).
However, he only averaged 4.2 PPG and 2.0 RPG in 10.2 MPG across 46 appearances last season, and played just 8.1 MPG in 32 games this season, averaging 2.9 PPG and 1.2 RPG. He has been behind Donovan Clingan and Robert Williams on Portland’s depth chart in ’25/26, receiving about equal playing time as rookie Yang Hansen.
The Trail Blazers have been hit hard by injuries all season long, with Scoot Henderson, Matisse Thybulle, Blake Wesley, Jrue Holiday, and Jerami Grant all missing extended time and Kris Murray currently out indefinitely due to a lumbar strain.
Scoot Henderson In Final Stage Of Hamstring Recovery
Third-year guard Scoot Henderson has yet to play for the Trail Blazers this season as he recovers from a left hamstring tear, but his debut may not be far off. According to Sean Highkin of The Rose Garden Report (Substack link), Henderson is in the final stage of his recovery process and has begun to take part in full-contact practices.
“He’s able to do some contact now,” interim head coach Tiago Splitter said on Thursday. “Getting better. I don’t have a date for you yet, but he’s doing a lot and feeling well after practice.”
When the Blazers first announced a week before training camp that Henderson had torn his hamstring in a workout, they indicated he would be sidelined from basketball activities for about four-to-eight weeks.
However, general manager Joe Cronin told reporters on media day a few days later that Henderson’s timeline for resuming basketball activities could extend beyond that initial projection, since hamstring injuries can be “stubborn” and tricky to handle. Four months later, the 6’3″ guard – who will turn 22 next Tuesday, appears on the verge of returning.
The third overall pick in the 2023 draft, Henderson had an up-and-down rookie season but began to show real improvement in his second year in the NBA. In his final 35 games of the 2024/25 season, he averaged 14.2 points, 5.2 assists, and 3.1 rebounds in 27.5 minutes per game, with a shooting line of .434/.384/.766 shooting line.
In addition to Henderson, the Blazers could also get another injured guard, Blake Wesley, back in the not-too-distant future. Wesley has been out since October 31 due to foot surgery, but Splitter indicated on Thursday that he’s also in the final stage of his recovery, per Highkin.
Wesley was playing a regular role off Portland’s bench, averaging 17.6 minutes per night in his five healthy games, before going down with that injury.
The Blazers will face contract decisions on both Henderson and Wesley this summer, as the former will be eligible for a rookie scale extension while the latter will be an unrestricted free agent.
And-Ones: NBA Europe, Rising Stars, Blakeney, Draft
Speaking to Sportico (Twitter video link), NBA deputy commissioner Mark Tatum said one key component of the NBA Europe project is the league’s desire to address the fact that some of the biggest markets across the Atlantic don’t currently have basketball teams that are permanent members of the EuroLeague.
“There’s no top-tier team in the U.K. at all. The U.K’s the biggest market in Europe. There’s no top-tier basketball team there, in London, in Manchester,” Tatum said. “There’s no permanent top-tier in the top league there in Paris, in Berlin, in Rome. So they’re missing the biggest commercial markets.
“… Our idea is to create this league, call it 12 to 16 teams, with the biggest countries having permanent franchises. Call it the U.K., Spain, Germany, Italy, France. Two teams in each one of those markets that we know with certainty will have franchises there. And then we’ll open it up to the rest of the (European) ecosystem.”
Teams based in cities like Barcelona, Madrid, Athens, and Istanbul have become EuroLeague powerhouses, but London doesn’t have a team in the league and has never exactly been a basketball hotbed. As Joe Vardon of The Athletic writes, the NBA believes there’s untapped potential in the market.
“Just walking the streets here and being in the hotels, I hear from people all the time saying, ‘I’m sleep-deprived following your league,'” NBA commissioner Adam Silver told Vardon before this month’s Grizzlies/Magic game in London. “There are more people approaching us and saying, ‘I’d love to have the London franchise,’ and I think it’s not just because it’s such an attractive market, but because there’s no top-tier basketball team right now. So, there’s lots of groups seeing an opportunity to create a new brand here.”
Here are a few more odds and ends from around the basketball world:
- After announcing this year’s Rising Stars participants earlier in the week, the NBA announced the rosters and the semifinal matchups on Tuesday evening (Twitter links). Among the notable team-ups? Mavericks forward Cooper Flagg, 2025’s No. 1 overall pick, will play alongside No. 2 pick Dylan Harper and his Spurs teammate Stephon Castle on Carmelo Anthony‘s team.
- Former NBA guard Antonio Blakeney, who played for the Bulls from 2017-19, was accused earlier this month of being one of the ringleaders in an illegal gambling scheme involving U.S. college players and game-fixing in China. ESPN’s Michael Rothstein has the full story on Blakeney, who faces wire fraud charges and could face a lengthy prison sentence if he’s convicted.
- Federal prosecutors investigating illegal gambling are looking at additional NBA games beyond the seven contests cited in an indictment this past fall, says Mike Vorkunnov of The Athletic. That fall indictment was the one that led to the arrest of Terry Rozier and is connected to the case that resulted in Jontay Porter being banned from the NBA.
- Jonathan Wasserman of Bleacher Report has updated his 2026 NBA mock draft, while Sam Vecenie of The Athletic shares some of his draft-related intel. Within his story, Vecenie considers how NIL will impact the 2026 draft class and identifies Arizona’s Brayden Burries and Illinois’ Keaton Wagler as two prospects whose stocks are very much on the rise.
NBA Announces New Dates For Four Games
The NBA has officially announced new dates for two games that were postponed last weekend due to weather conditions. Sunday’s Nuggets/Grizzlies game in Memphis and Mavericks/Bucks contest in Milwaukee were both affected by a severe winter storm.
The new dates for those games are as follows:
- Nuggets at Grizzlies: Wednesday, March 18 (7:00 pm Central time).
- Mavericks at Bucks: Tuesday, March 31 (7:00 pm CT).
As a result of these schedule adjustments, the NBA has also moved the dates for two additional games involving the Mavericks, Grizzlies, and Knicks. Here are those changes:
- Knicks at Grizzlies: Moved from Wednesday, March 18 to Wednesday, April 1 (7:00 pm CT).
- Mavericks at Grizzlies: Moved from Wednesday, April 1 to Thursday, March 12 (7:00 pm CT).
The Mavericks and Grizzlies both had two days off scheduled for March 11 and 12, so it made sense for the NBA to move one of their matchups against one another to that date in order to accommodate the other changes.
The Knicks had been scheduled for a back-to-back set on March 17 and 18, but will now have a back-to-back on March 31 and April 1 instead. The contest in Memphis will be the fourth and final game in a road trip that otherwise would’ve ended in Houston.