Will Richard is out for the Golden State Warriors’ game against the New Orleans Pelicans on Monday with a torn ulnar collateral ligament in his left thumb, according to the official NBA injury report. Anthony Slater of ESPN first reported the diagnosis.
The Warriors have not given a timeline. The injury report carries the diagnosis and Monday’s designation and nothing beyond it — no return date, no word on whether the thumb needs surgery. Several outlets have put a length on the absence; none of those figures come from the team.
Richard is the fourth name on that report. Jimmy Butler III is out following a right ACL repair and Moses Moody following a left patellar tendon repair, and Kristaps Porziņģis is listed as not with the team after stepping away from basketball on Nov. 6. Richard had been absorbing some of what those absences left behind, playing 12 minutes off the bench in Saturday’s overtime win over the Orlando Magic.
Golden State is 7-3 and has won seven straight, which is the part that makes this awkward rather than alarming. The streak has been built with a rotation already two wings short, and the minutes Richard was taking now go back to a bench that was thin before tonight — Brandin Podziemski, Georges Niang, Brandon Williams and De’Anthony Melton, with Gary Payton II and Gui Santos both carrying knocks of their own on Saturday’s report.
What is not yet known is the only thing that decides how much this matters: how long. Until the Warriors say, a torn thumb ligament is a diagnosis without a duration, and the numbers circulating tonight are other people’s estimates.
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