The Indiana Pacers will start the season without star forward Danny Granger, who has been sidelined indefinitely with a sore left knee.
The team said yesterday its top scorer and former All-Star is seeking a second opinion from a doctor as he continues to recover from a knee injury suffered during last spring’s Eastern Conference semifinals. It’s a tough blow for the Pacers, who had high hopes heading into tonight’s season opener in Toronto.
For the first time since the early 2000s, fans thought they may have an NBA title contender as all five starters from last season’s playoff run returned.
Now Indiana must contend with the loss of Granger, a small forward who averaged a team-best 18.7 points per game last season, and the possibility that starting point guard George Hill might not be 100 percent. Hill did not play in any preseason games because of a left thumb injury and a right hip-pointer.
Coach Frank Vogel told the Indianapolis Star Monday Hill is expected to start against the Raptors and that he would like to play Hill about 30 minutes per game.
“You’re never going to feel like yourself the first day back, but I feel a lot better being out there than sitting down,” Hill told the newspaper.
Hill is expected to fill a vital role this season after returning to his hometown last year, averaging 9.6 points, 3.0 rebounds and 2.9 assists. He played well enough that the Pacers traded Darren Collison to Dallas during the offseason.
Losing Granger is more disconcerting.
He has averaged 18.2 points and 5.2 rebounds in seven NBA seasons, and though he played through the injury in May, it flared up again while he was doing offseason workouts. In September, Granger underwent blood-platelet treatment.
“It hurts,” Granger said then as he described the procedure. “They take the blood out and inject it back in, so it hurts. But it helps you heal tremendously.”
T’WOLVES: The Timberwolves have exercised its third-year options on guard Ricky Rubio and forward Derrick Williams for the 2013-14 season.
Rubio averaged 10.6 points, 8.2 assists and 4.2 rebounds per game last season. He finished as runner-up in the NBA’s Rookie of the Year voting and finished sixth in the league, and first among rookies, in assists last season. The second-year guard from Spain is recovering from surgery in March to repair torn left knee ligaments.
Williams appeared in all 66 games for the Timberwolves as a rookie, averaging 8.8 points and 4.7 rebounds per game. The second overall pick in the 2011 NBA draft out of Arizona finished fifth among rookies in rebounding and seventh in scoring last season.
JAZZ: Utah has exercised an option that will keep coach Tyrone Corbin under contract through the 2013-14 season.
Corbin was thrust into the job following the abrupt retirement of Jerry Sloan in February 2011. He guided the team to the playoffs.
BULLS: Chicago has exercised its third-year option on former first-round draft pick Jimmy Butler for the 2013-14 season.
The 6-foot-7 Butler appeared in 42 games as a rookie last season and averaged 2.6 points and 1.3 rebounds in a limited role.