In the NBA, scary injuries aren’t always basketball-related
Utah Jazz forward Jaren Jackson Jr. cheers on his teammates from the bench during the first half of the game against the Denver Nuggets at the Delta Center in Salt Lake City on Monday, March 2, 2026. | Rio Giancarlo, Deseret News This article was first published as the Jazz Insiders newsletter.
Sign up to receive the newsletter in your inbox each Friday. On Thursday, Philadelphia 76ers center Joel Embiid was diagnosed with appendicitis and taken to a Houston hospital for surgery. Last month, Detroit Pistons star Cade Cunningham was diagnosed with a collapsed lung and sidelined until April 8.
An appendectomy is certainly not basketball-related, and a collapsed lung is not an injury that is often associated with basketball (though we’ve seen a few before). We’ve also seen players deal with blood clots and tumors and Bell’s palsy and other afflictions that aren’t avoidable or basketball-related. The Utah Jazz even experienced something similar back when they traded for Jaren Jackson Jr.
at the trade deadline. Jackson had a small, benign tumor in his knee. Surgery to remove the mass sidelined Jackson for the remainder of the season.
I bring up these things because the Jazz were able to see a silver lining in Jackson’s surgery. He would not suffer adversely long term, they would take care of something that could have caused problems if not addressed, and they could keep him sidelined — keeping a good player off the court in a tanking season. But there’s not always a silver lining.