The NBA season will restart on July 30 and the Warriors are off the list of the 22 teams invited to play the Orlando bubble games. It seemed to be bad news for the once-mighty Dubs but it has to be a welcome development for Klay Thompson, who is now confirmed to miss the entire season.
If indeed the next NBA season will open in December 2020, the whole time that Thompson would be out of action will amount to 18 months. If this is the case, it's not a bad thing at all for the shooting guard, according to former Warriors star Tim Hardaway.
Recall that Thompson tore his ACL in Game 6 of the 2019 NBA Finals, in which Golden State failed to defend the crown against the Kawhi Leonard-led Toronto Raptors. That was June so it would be a year and a half before the 30-year-old gets to see competitive action.
Hardaway said Thompson needed the break, explaining that the forced vacation will recharge the injured player, whose issue saw the end of career for many NBA players in the past.
"No question [it] rejuvenated his career. He can sit down and not come back until December, and everybody is gonna be fresh at that particular time," Clutch Points reported Hardaway as saying.
The ex-Warriors also noted that long hiatus came at a time that Thompson turned 30 and it was perfect. Hardaway said having more time to nurse an injury and undergo rehab should be an advantage, and more so for cases with the same age level as Thompson.
The urge to return to play could be strong now on the All-Star but he should realize later on that being inactive at the moment will prove a blessing in disguise.
Already, the benefits of having so much time to rehab and workout to Thompson were reported by GSW coach Steve Kerr. According to NBC Sports, Kerr touched base with the star last week and what the coach saw was impressive.
Reportedly, any sign of the injury last year will not be seen if the way Thompson is training at the moment would be the gauge. Kerr reported that the small forward is in top shape and his movement during practice showed that the ACL no longer bothers.
Most importantly, Thompson is back to his old deadly scoring ways again.
"He was moving well and, as you would expect, just knocking down [shots] ... He's right on schedule, and everything's going well," the Warriors coach was reported as saying.
Thompson averaged 24.5 points per game during the playoffs in 2019 and if both Kerr and Hardaway are to be believed, the star is ready to match or even surpass those numbers when he gets to hit the court again a few months from now.
