Rodney Stuckey is expected to miss 4-6 weeks because of a left patellar tendon strain, according to the Pacers‘ website. The shooting guard suffered the strain against the Sixers on Sunday.
The timeline means Stuckey will certainly miss the remainder of the regular season and he’ll likely miss the first round of the playoffs. Indiana enters the day owning the seventh seed in the conference, though Atlanta and Milwaukee, the two teams ahead of them in the standings (via tiebreakers) also share a 37-36 record. All three teams are only two games of the Heat, who currently own the conference’s eighth spot. The Bulls, Pistons and Hornets are sitting outside the playoffs as of now, but they are all within four games of Indiana. Depending on how the Pacers finish the season, Stuckey may not see the court again until the 2017/18 season.
The team is paying him $7MM this season and he has a player option worth $7MM for next year.
Before suffering the strain, Stuckey was battling a knee injury. He’s only been able to play 39 contests for the Pacers this season. He’s averaging 7.2 points per game while shooting 37.3% from the field and sporting a 9.5 player efficiency rating.
According to Zach Lowe, Stuckey (and a few other Pacers) have bizarre contracts where their player options basically disappear if they are waived in the prior season. It would be easy to see the Pacers dumping Stuckey now and getting out of next year’s commitment.