Is rising Nuggets star sitting out playoffs to protect his future? Debunking nonsense theory

Currently down 3-2 to the Minnesota Timberwolves in their first-round playoff series, the Denver Nuggets could use all the help they can get to complete the rare 3-1 comeback . Unfortunately, they're probably not going to get it from glue-guy forward Aaron Gordon, as he contends with calf tightness , or from rising young star Peyton Watson, as he recovers from a setback in his Grade 2 hamstring injury recovery, which he suffered all the way back in early February. At the time of this writing, it's unclear when both forwards will return to Denver's lineup.

It's the latter Nuggets player's injury situation that has created a very toxic conversation in some online spaces. You see, Watson did come back from his hamstring strain in late March. However, he tweaked it again after only appearing in five games because guess what: A Grade 2 hamstring strain is tricky and very hard to recover from until it's absolutely 100 percent.

And even then, it can still be finicky in the immediate return to athletic competition. Watson's hamstring injury is the same one Gordon famously suffered in last year's Denver playoff run, before he tried to push himself through it in a second-round Game 7 loss to the eventual NBA champion Oklahoma City Thunder. Gordon knew the potential major risks doing so would pose to the rest of his career, and he pushed himself anyway, even though he was clearly laboring.

Given that Gordon only appeared in 36 regular-season games this year and quickly suffered an injury setback in this year's postseason, it stands to reason he's still feeling the effects of that decision. Now, with Watson having barely played in the last three months for the Nuggets, the sentiment seems to be that he's actually healthy but is choosing not to help Denver in its dire straits. Why?