On that cursed Black Friday that took Derrick Rose and Andre Iguodala from good health, Marc Gasol was also taken from us with a grade two sprain of his left knee’s MCL. ‘Twas November 22nd of this year. It was a tough development for the Grizzlies and fantasy owners alike as he was shaping up into top-round two form before the untimely incident. His numbers: 16 Points Per Game, 7.1 rebounds, 4.3 assists, 1.1 blocks, 0.9 steals, on 45.8 shooting from the field, and 88.5 percent from the charity stripe.
Gasol has a history of being an injury-resistant player who also happens to recover quickly whenever he does get scraped up. Still, most estimates had him returning in two months time, and that was an optimistic assessment. That would put the Spaniard returning sometime at the end of January.
When confronted with the possibility of missing such a big chunk of time, the big man was his usual defiant self:
“They try to give me a week — three, four, six. I don’t care what number they say, I told them as soon as I can put my foot down on the floor and I can walk, I’m going to rush it and speed the process.”
Then this happened:
Wont need these anymore… pic.twitter.com/VaNBWlyB4G
— Marc Gasol (@MarcGasol) December 18, 2013
Gasol is off his crutches just three-and-a-half weeks into his recovery. That spells good things for his timetable, for fantasy owners, and for the Memphis Grizz who have the Western Conference’s third-worst record but who are still within clawing distance of the eighth playoff seed.
Who knows, we might just see the Defensive Player of the Year back on the court before the year is out.
