During Game 2 of the 2024 NBA Finals, Kristaps Porzingis suffered a rare injury shortly after missing most of the Boston Celtics playoff run from a calf injury.
On his X account, The Athletic’s Shams Charania described it as a “torn medial retinaculum allowing dislocation of the posterior tibialis tendon.”
The injury held Porzingis out of Games 3 and 4, but he played in Game 5. After the Celtics beat the Dallas Mavericks, Joe Mazzulla confirmed Porzingis overruled the Celtics medical staff to play in the series-clinching win on “Pardon My Take.”
Now comes the offseason, and the Celtics have confirmed via their X account that Porzingis will need surgery for his newest injury.
The question will be how long Porzingis will be out and whether he will be ready for opening night.
Brad Stevens Says Kristaps Porzingis Will Miss Start of Season
In an interview with The Ringer’s Ryen Russillo, President of Basketball Operations Brad Stevens revealed that while there’s no respected return date as of now, the Celtics expect that Porzingis will miss the start of the 2024-25 season.
“Kristaps, after his surgery, we don’t know exactly when he’ll be back, but he’ll probably miss at least the very start of the season. So that’ll be a great opportunity for us to do things (differently) and have to find different solutions.”
With Porzingis expected to be unavailable for the start of the season, Al Horford will likely fill in for him until he returns. Horford has plenty of familiarity with the Celtics as their starting center dating back to 2016. He also did a fine job filling in for Porzingis for most of their 2024 title run. Even without their starting center for most of their run, Boston still went 16-3 during the 2024 NBA postseason.
However, Horford is 38, and pending any surprises, the Celtics are likely to rest him on back-to-backs, which they’ve been doing since 2022. Boston will likely try to add frontcourt depth to preserve Horford and Porzingis for when the 2025 NBA Playoffs start.
Kristaps Porzingis’ Injury is Latest of Many
Porzingis’ injury is the latest of the many he’s suffered since coming to the NBA in 2015. The only time he has ever crossed the 70-game barrier was his rookie year with the New York Knicks. Since then, he has played as many as 65 games and played as few as 43. That also excludes him missing the entire 2018-19 season after he tore his ACL.
Porzingis played in seven total playoff games for the Celtics in 2024, which is tied for the most he’s ever played in a postseason. The difference between 2021 and 2024 is he only played in one series for the Mavericks in the first round. With the Celtics, they played all the way up to the NBA Finals, and two injuries severely limited his availability.
The Celtics knew what they were getting into when they acquired Porzingis from the Washington Wizards. Even though he hardly played, he made it evident why the Celtics added him when they had the chance.
The Celtics impressively won it all without him. However, they will need him healthy to help their chances of repeating.
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