Andrew Bogut, after suffering a season-ending injury one minute into his Cavs career, is headed towards an uncertain future in the NBA
It’s not funny. It never was funny. Andrew Bogut has spent his NBA career dealing with injury after injury. Yeah, alright, we already know he’s injury prone. How can he not be classified as such?
The recent injury was really just…how would you explain it? The past couple of years really haven’t been kind to Bogut.
When Bogut was playing with the Golden State Warriors in 2016, he made it to the NBA Finals where he ended up getting injured in Game 5. The Warriors lost a solid big man; really, the only big man who brought in toughness, defense, and rebounding, which were the weak points of the Warriors (yeah, even they had weaknesses).
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His injury got lost in the shuffle because this was the same game Draymond Green was suspended for Green’s desire to play soccer with people’s body parts for an extended time during the entire season.
But, you could argue the loss of Bogut did more damage than the loss of Green. Hey, we’re not here to talk about that though.
Essentially, Bogut going down basically led Kevin Durant to be more comfortable, (and the Warriors being more open to) leaving Oklahoma City and going for a legit chance at a championship (if he’s actually playing in the playoffs). That meant Bogut, along with others, would need to be sent packing.
Bogut ended up with the Dallas Mavericks. At first, it seemed alright, until Bogut said he thought it would be best to come off of the bench. Very nice of him. Oh yes, a NBA champion decided to put his pride away for the better of the team. He suggested he be taken out of the starting lineup. Cool.
But then, he made other comments, like he wouldn’t mind being traded and even such things as he’s basically looking at other teams as his contract was set to expire. It became clear that Bogut and the Mavericks were not going to work out and he simply was not playing in games.
Oh dear.
Just about everybody knew Bogut would be bought out of his contract when he was traded from the Mavericks to the Philadelphia 76ers. The Sixers have billions of centers and Bogut was certainly not going to play for a team that was nowhere close to what he just saw with the Warriors. Nope.
So, yeah, the Sixers gave him his wish. Rumors spread quickly that the Cleveland Cavaliers would be interested in signing the big man. The Cavs needed the size and Bogut is a winner. The Cavs took a chance. It…well, it didn’t work out.
Is anyone surprised?
That’s the unfortunate part of this whole thing. It wasn’t surprising to me. When I first heard of the injury, I was not shocked that it happened less than a minute in his Cavs debut. It was the same story. Now, the Cavs have released him and moved on to another former Bucks center, Larry Sanders.
What’s next for Andrew Bogut?
Well, he’s 32 years old. With his injury history, you can’t really expect him to change that status and reputation he has. So, at this point, if a team looks at him, this is what they would expect:
- Big man who can hopefully play 60 games in the regular season
- Extra defense and rebounding
- If he can stay healthy, would be critical to championship run
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Let’s make no mistake here: Bogut is a really good player. Um, yeah, we’ve heard this many times about many players. “He’s good when healthy”. The debate is: but he’s not healthy; he rarely is. No, Bogut is nowhere close to Greg Oden. But, for a first pick overall, you kind of are expecting a superstar or at least a star. Bogut never really got to stardom; he had some solid years, but games played might play an ultimate factor in things.
This story from FOX Sports lists the injury history of Bogut. Just awful.
Bogut will also have to accept that getting big money is over. Before the big salary cap jump of the 2016 offseason, Bogut’s contract took up a lot of space. Not quite a max size, but he was making double figures per year.
Bogut may end up making the same amount of money, even with the salary cap jump expected this offseason. But, from a percentage standpoint, he wouldn’t be making much.
Is he still a starter? He’s still better than quite a few centers out there so yeah. But, where ever he goes, you know that team will make sure there is some insurance for him.
It’s tough to say how much more of Bogut we’ll see. It’s not like he’s had typical career-ending injuries. He’s done more breaking of bones than tearing of ligaments. You could also say he’s just been unlucky and had some freak accidents. I would expect Bogut to play at least two more years, but that’s up to him.
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He may get to a place where the game isn’t fun anymore. He may be tired of the injuries. Maybe he needs to think about life after basketball and how his body will be in those years. Ultimately, I wouldn’t be surprised to hear NBA teams are not all that interested in him anymore.