Rockets forward Jae’Sean Tate will return to action on Thursday against Utah, sources tell Kelly Iko of The Athletic (Twitter link). Tate will be on a minutes restriction, according to Mark Berman of Fox 26 Houston (Twitter link).
The 27-year-old has only appeared in three games thus far this season, having last played on October 30. He has been dealing with a right ankle injury, which was evidently quite cumbersome given his lengthy absence.
Tate re-signed with Houston on a three-year, $22.1MM deal as a restricted free agent in the offseason. In his first two NBA seasons, both with the Rockets, he averaged 11.6 PPG, 5.4 RPG, 2.7 APG and 1.1 SPG on .501/.310/.701 shooting in 148 games (135 starts, 27.7 MPG).
It will be interesting to see which players have their minutes reduced with Tate returning to the lineup — the Rockets have a lot of young forwards on their roster.
This guy is out of the PJ Tucker mold, he does all the little things to win and it might not show in the stat sheet.
Winning column, either