NOVEMBER 13: Williams underwent right knee surgery on Monday to reconstruct a torn ligament after he sustained a patellar dislocation., the team tweets. Williams is expected to make a full recovery for the 2024/25 season.
NOVEMBER 10: Trail Blazers big man Robert Williams will have to undergo season-ending right knee surgery, sources tell Adrian Wojnarowski of ESPN. He’s expected to go under the knife early next week and to be fully recovered for the 2024/25 season, Woj adds.
Wojnarowski previously reported that Williams would require surgery, but said on Monday that the center’s camp and medical professionals were still discussing what type of procedure would be necessary.
The Athletic reported on Monday that one option would be a cleanup procedure with a two- or three-month recovery timeline, while the other option would be a season-ending procedure that would repair bone and ligament damage in Williams’ right kneecap.
It appears Williams will take the latter route.
It’s a devastating blow to a promising young player who has already been significantly impacted by health problems since entering the NBA as the 27th overall pick in 2018.
Entering this season, the 26-year-old had been limited to 209 of 390 possible regular season games in his first five years in the NBA as a Celtic. He’ll appear in just six of 82 in his first year in Portland.
In his healthiest season, 2021/22, Williams nearly averaged a double-double (10.0 PPG, 9.6 RPG) to go along with 2.2 blocks per night and a 73.6% field goal percentage.
Williams was part of the package that Portland received from Boston this fall in exchange for Jrue Holiday. According to Wojnarowski, there were some teams around the NBA hoping that the Blazers would put Williams back on the trade block prior to the 2024 trade deadline — an in-season move seems extremely unlikely now.
The Trail Blazers have one open spot on their standard 15-man roster that could be used to add more frontcourt depth. They have about $5.3MM in breathing room below the luxury tax line, notes ESPN’s Bobby Marks (Twitter link), so they could comfortably sign a free agent to a minimum-salary deal without becoming a taxpayer.
As Marks observes, Portland could also apply for a disabled player exception, which wouldn’t give the team another roster spot but could provide another cap exception to make a trade, signing, or waiver claim later in the season. If granted by the NBA, that exception would be worth $5,785,715, half of Williams’ salary.
Time is up on those knees. It is a shame since he still flashes some really athletic moments. If he could stretch the floor a bit I think he could extend his career.
His career is fine, he’s just a backup ala Nerlens Noel instead of an All-Defense starter.
Blazers gave Lillard away for nothing
“He didn’t wanna be here so least we got something!”
In retrospect. Should have taken the Miami deal.
Blazers could of had a package led by Randle and Fournier and several picks. Blazers kept hoping Miami would eventually give up Bam. That was never happening
The mental gymnastics one must go through to say the Blazers got nothing for Lillard is a feat that can only be mastered by Miami Heat fanboys. 10/10 from the Ukrainian mental gymnastics judges.
Can’t counter their argument. So personal attacks.
Late 1st round draft picks that will amount to nothing, injury prone Brogdon, and a dude made of glass.
You typed all that just to admit they were correct. Pitiful. Sad. Do better.
Except for all those draft picks and Ayton, Brogdon, and Timelord when he gets back later in the rebuild.
Ayton was already overpaid playing for the suns. His offensive output has dropped significantly.
Brogdon is injury prone
Timelord is made of glass
And late 1st round picks are hard to hit on.
Not to mention Ayton was going to be traded for Nurkic anyway before the Dame trade happened, there was talk about that for couple months. I hardly even consider Ayton as part of the Dame haul.
Let me help reset your frame: They aren’t trying to win…. if you are valuing the deal for how many wins this team will get, you fundamentally don’t understand rebuilds.
Again, Brogdon: veteran presence. 6th man keeps games interesting. So that they remain competitive games instead of G-league games in the 2nd half.
Timelord is a bet on the recovery and packaging in a deal later… probably for LAL, BOS, MIA, the usual suspects.
Ayton #1 pick. No major injuries. Big time, early career play-off experience. BTW. No chance POR gets him just for Nurkic… had to have Greyson.
And late FRPs, strategically, are development pieces. Don’t forget, POR will suck, so they are banking on their own FRPs to hit big. The late FRPs should enhance the development of the stars, be used as trade chips for skills to fill other rosters, and maybe you get lucky and someone pulls it all together, gets the right opportunity, and takes off.
These deals were all solid for everyone. There simply is no way to evaluate the results yet. Ya’ll just have some wierd bone to pick.
This is truly disappointing, for Portland, for Robert, for the fans.
Damaged goods ….. Celtics should pay a penalty to Blazers.
Why? He passed a physical. They could have said no like Clippers did regarding Brogdon.
Blazers scouts should have known, any Celtics fan that wasn’t drinking the green kool aid could have told you Rob Williams hasn’t been the same player he was a few years ago, he was a shell of himself last season in the few games he did play.
Called it… as much as it sucks, I don’t think Time Lord can stay healthy. Too big to be jumping around like he does. You can’t train your cartilage.