THE U.S. National Basketball Association on Christmas Day (December 26, Manila time) won’t be the same without Kobe Bryant.
Yes, Christmas won’t be the same without you, Kobe.
Bryant, the fourth all-time leading scorer in NBA history, will be in the sidelines when his injury-riddled Los Angeles Lakers host the two-time defending NBA titlist Miami Heat at the Staples Center in one of five Christmas Day games (6:00 a.m., Manila time) in the world’s ultimate roundball forum.
Bryant is out until early February next year (or about six weeks) after fracturing a bone (lateral tibial plateau) in his left knee during a 96-92 win at Memphis last December 17. In six games (2-4) this season, the 6-foot-7, 35-year-old guard was averaging 13.6 points and 6.3 assists an outing, including a season high-matching 21-point effort against the Grizzlies wherein he was injured – again.
Bryant, who is in his 18th NBA campaign, had just returned to action on December 8 after missing the 2013 playoffs last April and the Lakers’ first 19 regular games (10-9) this season while recovering from surgery for a torn left Achilles tendon last April.
As if they did not have enough misfortune, the Lakers also will be without the services of point guards Steve Blake, Steve Nash (played only six games) and Jordan Farmar due to various injuries.
(Farmar is the closest to returning and may yet be available.) In addition to the Lakers-Heat encounter, the other games on Christmas Day are Chicago at Brooklyn (1:00 a.m., Manila time), Oklahoma City at New York (3:30 a.m. MT), Houston at San Antonio (9:00 a.m. MT), and the Los Angeles Clippers at Golden State (11:30 a.m. MT).
Key players will also not be around in the Brooklyn-Chicago duel. Bulls point guard Derrick Rose, who missed all of last season while recovering from reconstructive surgery (for a torn anterior cruciate ligament) to his left knee in late April 2012, is out for the remainder of the season after suffering a torn meniscus in his right knee during a game in Portland on November 22.
Three days later, Rose underwent successful surgery. The 6-foot-3 playmaker, who in 2011 became the youngest player in NBA history to win Most Valuable Player honors at age 22, was averaging 15.9 scores and 4.3 assists per game at the time of his latest injury.
The underachieving Nets, who own an NBA-high team payroll of around $190 million (player salaries and luxury tax), have All-Star playmaker Deron Williams and backcourter Jason Terry back in harness following injuries, aging stars Paul Pierce and Kevin Garnett seem to have some gas left in their tank and even back-troubled Russian Andrei Kirilenko is now healthy enough to play.
But with a huge hole in the middle following the loss of high-priced center Brook Lopez for the remainder of the season, it does not seem like Brooklyn will challenge for supremacy in the East.
The 7-foot, 25-year-old Lopez, who is in the second year of a four-year, $60-million maximum contract he signed in the summer of 2012, once more fractured the fifth metatarsal of his surgically-repaired right foot during a December 20 game in Philadelphia. He originally sustained the fracture in December 2011.
At the time of the injury, Lopez was norming a career-high 20.7 points every time out. The New York Knicks, another underachieving team from the Atlantic Division, will battle the Oklahoma City Thunder at the Madison Square Garden perhaps without their top gun Carmelo Anthony, who suffered a sprained left ankle in a Dec. 23 contest in Orlando. (There were no NBA games on Christmas eve, December 24.)
The Houston Rockets are not a healthy lot, too. Team scoring leader James Harden has a sprained right ankle, Jeremy Lin has just returned from a back spasms issue and guard Patrick Beverley is out for six weeks after suffering a right hand fracture in a December 21 game at Detroit.
With so many NBA stars in sick bay, Christmas Day games won’t be the same this year.