While one Kentucky big man in Karl-Anthony Towns appearing to have a clean bill of health and all the hype surrounding him going into the 2015 NBA Draft, his three-named running mate, Willie Cauley-Stein, has been trending way down lately.
Teams higher up in the draft have been interested in Willie due to his defensive versatility, high endurance and shot blocking but there are a ton of concerns about his suspect ball-handling, shooting and overall offensive game.
Now the newest concern about Cauley-Stein’s ankle is that it’s no where near fully healed and he might actually have to undergo surgery and miss some time.
Following from Chad Ford on Zach Lowe’s ‘Lowe Post’ podcast talking about why Willie Cauley-Stein is projected to fall to the Indiana Pacers with the 11th pick in the 2015 NBA Draft.
The reason that Cauley-Stein might be there right now is concerns about his ankle. Here’s where medical comes in. He broke his ankle at the end of his sophomore season. Had it surgically repaired. Was fine this whole season, played well. Says he’s fine, looks fine when he’s out there on the court. He’s cutting, he’s doing everything, doesn’t look like an issue.
But when they’re at the combine, a couple things. They noticed that the fracture was only about 50% healed, which was discouraging for the doctors. They also noticed that some of the screws and the plate that was put in aren’t quite positioned quite the way some of the NBA docs would like them positioned.
The most likely scenario is at some point, it’s asymptomatic right now, but at some point in the next year, Willie Cauley-Stein is going to have to have surgery on that ankle. It’s going to have to be cleaned up. Plates going to have to be adjusted to promote that healing to get back to full strength.
There’s no concern about chronic ankle injury. No concern this will trouble him his whole career. But it does mean he’s going to miss 4-6 months, maybe a little more, at some point.
The good thing about Cauley-Stein is that just about any team who selects him in the NBA Draft could wait for him to heal. Whether he falls as far as 20 or goes as high as 5 to the Orlando Magic, most of those teams can wait and allow Cauley-Stein to go under some proper treatment to heal his issues.
Ford is right, Cauley-Stein looked great this past season and he looked fine walking around the streets of New York this past week during his pre-draft appearances. If the surgery is just a cleanup, then it needs to happen as soon as possible so he can get on the court immediately and avoid the injury issues of other past Kentucky players like Nerlens Noel and Julius Randle.
