The San Antonio Spurs have ruled out Kawhi Leonard for Game 1 of their playoff series against the Golden State Warriors, to the surprise of nobody.
Leonard has not played since early January and updates on his status have been few and far between. It seems that he was cleared by the Spurs’ medical team to resume playing, but he has not received clearance from the medical team he’s been seeing in New York. That probably explains the nature for the absence that was provided by the Spurs on Twitter. Rather than cite the cause as being a quad injury, they put in parentheses “return from injury management”.
INJURY REPORT: Kawhi Leonard (return from injury management) is out for tomorrow’s Spurs-Warriors game.
— San Antonio Spurs (@spurs) April 14, 2018
Leonard’s lengthy absence has been a cause of tension among the Spurs all season long. There was a report saying the Spurs were at odds with Leonard. Then you see comments from his teammates that seem to confirm that things aren’t peachy.
San Antonio managed to make the playoffs as an eight-seed without Leonard. There’s no guarantee that they would be immediately better with him playing considering the adjustments they might have to make.
