Amick: DeAaron Fox injury raises early questions about player participation

And now for the other side of the Player Participation Policy debate that is already raging in this early regular season, we present the Sacramento Kings’ De’Aaron Fox.

More specifically, it’s time to talk about his ailing right ankle and the question of how he’ll handle its recovery amid this changed NBA landscape where there’s so much more incentive for players to rush back.

Kings All-Star De’Aaron Fox has avoided significant injury, but has sustained a moderate sprain of his right ankle and he is likely to miss some time, sources tell me and @sam_amick. Fox played through the sprain down stretch of 37 points and victory over Lakers on Sunday.

— Shams Charania (@ShamsCharania) October 30, 2023

If all you’d seen was the play-by-play breakdown of Sacramento’s overtime win over the Los Angeles Lakers on Sunday night, you might be confused as to why Fox’s health is a topic of conversation here. After all, everything that happened below took place after the ankle sprain that he suffered with 7:27 left in the fourth quarter and that we now know will cost him some time:

7:27 — Fox is subbed out for Davion Mitchell
6:43 — Fox returns, replacing Mitchell (he’s greeted by a deafening roar at the Golden 1 Center; his personal theme song, Jimi Hendrix’s “Foxey Lady,” booms in the background)
5:56 — Fox hits a 3 from the left wing over Anthony Davis, cutting the Lakers’ lead to 104-103
3:54 — Fox drives the lane, is fouled by Davis and hits one of two free throws; Kings lead 108-104
2:39 — Fox defends LeBron James in the paint; grabs the rebound after a missed Gabe Vincent 3
2:27 — Fox takes the ball up the floor, isos Taurean Prince and buries an 8-foot jumper in the lane (“De’Aaron Fox — hotter than fish grease!” commentator Mark Jones bellowed). Kings lead 110-104.
1:36 — Fox finds Keegan Murray on the left wing for a 3; Kings lead 113-106
0:26 — Fox, who was fouled in the backcourt by Vincent, hits two free throws; Kings lead 115-113
0:13 — Fox is subbed out for Mitchell for the final defensive possession

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3:31 — After seemingly ignoring coach Mike Brown’s request for him to come out, Fox is finally removed from the game for good. His final stat line: 37 points, eight assists, four rebounds and a game-high plus-15 mark in the 132-127 win.

But here’s what the box score didn’t tell you: Fox was in obvious pain for that entire stretch, limping around as if he had rocks in his shoe while somehow managing to will the Kings to their first home win of the season (they fell to Golden State on Friday night). It was the kind of gritty, inspiring performance fans typically love and appreciate.

What a warrior! What a stud! What a … mistake?

When the next morning comes, and with it the realization that he was playing on an ankle that had suffered a fair amount of damage, it’s a sobering reminder that these kinds of short-term choices can sometimes come with long-term consequences — impressive as it was.

It remains to be seen if that’s the case for Fox, whose game took such a massive leap last season and was off to a wonderful start in his first three games for this Kings team that is trying to grow into a title contender. Fox is expected to miss the Kings’ game at the Warriors on Wednesday, but a timeline is unclear from there. And to be fair to him and the Kings, it’s clear his motivation in the moment was to 1) beat the rival Lakers and 2) get off to the kind of good start to the season that they didn’t around this time a year ago when they started 0-4.

Still, the greater point stands.

With no end in sight for the 82-game marathon of a regular season, and with teams that make the NBA Finals playing as many as 100 games from October through June, this is the tricky part about the league’s new rules. Players know the stakes here, how they won’t be eligible for most of the annual individual awards unless they play in at least 65 games.

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That means MVP, All-NBA, Defensive Player of the Year, Sixth Man, etc. All of it. This is the stuff that contract bonuses are made of, and any player who gets hurt will surely be crunching the 65-and-over math in his mind as he ponders his return. That shift in the player calculus is now both inevitable and intentional. This is what Commissioner Adam Silver likely wanted when he decided to go down this legislative road.

No matter the reason — the changing of the “load management” data, influence of the forthcoming television rights negotiations or both — the league has made this hard-line decision to see how players react to a new set of rules that puts their money and status in peril. The goal, of course, is to deter the serial sitters from prioritizing the playoffs to such an extreme degree that the regular season pays too heavy of a price.

But the unintended consequence, potentially, is that players such as Fox might be tempted to make unwise decisions about when and why they choose to play. In that regard, this will be the guinea pig season for the league’s new load management rules.

Here’s hoping Fox and so many players like him don’t overcorrect by choosing to have their Willis Reed moments long before the playoffs arrive.

(Photo: Lachlan Cunningham / Getty Images)

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