![[Slater] Steve Kerr said he’s “concerned” about the increase in soft tissue injuries across the NBA. His medical staff believes the increased pace paired with the schedule has led to it. “They believe the wear and tear, the speed, the pace, the mileage is factoring into these injuries.”](https://www.rawchili.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/6zPHP68DMUsLVG16UrhtEeTNq7tFS2wv45Iq_sO4nNg-1920x1024.jpeg)
[Slater] Steve Kerr said he’s “concerned” about the increase in soft tissue injuries across the NBA. His medical staff believes the increased pace paired with the schedule has led to it. “They believe the wear and tear, the speed, the pace, the mileage is factoring into these injuries.”
34 comments
Been this way for years. The only way to mitigate it is by resting, but then the players get called lazy and we bring up players that played all 82 games like three decades ago.
If they’re not going to decrease the number of games for revenue and legacy reasons, and if they’re not gonna space out the schedule more for conflicts with other sports and offseason reasons, then maybe it’s time to explore the idea of expanding roster size.
the season has to get stretched pass June if the 82 games schedule is a must. Bc guys bodies can’t handle this era of basketball anymore it’s just obvious
This guy soccers.
The long term fix for this is less minutes per game for stars/starters and a bigger minutes spread across the rotation.
As the season gets closer to the playoffs you then gradually tighten the rotation.
30mpg might become the new norm for stars
I wonder if there’s rule changes that can decrease the pace of play.
There needs to be less games or no back to backs. There’s really no way around it, especially if you want your star players to play long enough to have longevity.
Out of curiosity, any Europeans in here can tell me the injury rate for high level domestic teams and euroleague/europcup/BCL teams, and how their schedule looks? I’ll guess they play much less games then 82?
My buddy plays in Europe (lower level leagues), and I believe he had a set schedule of Tuesday/Friday, and a couple tournament games sprinkled in.
It’s not the schedule, time to stop with this nonsense, it’s the pace and playstyle
You have your guys on offense constantly moving and running around in motions, trying to push the pace and beat the defense before they can set up because coaches don’t know how to run halfcourt offense anymore or beat the zone when teams go into it
It’s the way they play the game, not the schedule. Go watch a regular season game from 1992 on nba classics then watch an average game in 2025. There is no easy solution to fix the pace unless you want the rules to change again
Understanding and categorization of injuries is also increasing. Should not be penalized for resting your stars.
Would help greatly if your fucking boys stop doing karate leg sweep on our franchise player, Steve.
Just extend the season by a few weeks up to a month. They don’t directly compete with baseball (TV or arenas) and there are seven WNBA teams that share an arena but the playoffs already overlap the start of their season so they will just have to juggle potential conflicts with some teams a little longer. I’ve understood that the downside to this is that the players (and presumably staff) want summer break with their families. The vast majority of people don’t have that and I wonder what would happen if the option to stretch was put to the players.
Actual question – is there an increase in these injuries? Or was it just brutal the last little bit with some of the biggest stars going down?
How has no one mentioned the fact that kids are basically playing year-round now starting in middle school with all the different leagues and tournaments and camps? It’s not just basketball, it’s every sport now. Even for pro athletes, it catches up with you.
Bill Simmons was right
get rid of the corner 3 and allow handchecking again. corner 3’s are way too easy now and players cannot defend. scoring and pace is out of control.
Work in the footwear industry and this is a critical point that almost never gets mentioned in these injury discussions.
The foam technology in performance basketball shoes today is wildly different from even 10 years ago. These critical foams (TPU beads, supercritical EVA, etc.) are engineered for maximum energy return and cushioning – which sounds great until you think about what that means for a 13-year-old going through puberty wearing them 6 hours a day.
Your body adapts to the demands you place on it during development. If you’re doing that adaptation in shoes that artificially cushion every impact and maximize energy return, you’re potentially not building the same foundational strength in your tendons, ligaments, and intrinsic foot musculature that previous generations did. Your proprioception develops differently. Your biomechanics adapt to an artificial system.
Then select athletes hit the NBA where the schedule is what Kerr describes – relentless pace, maximum mileage, elite-level cutting and jumping – and their soft tissue just isn’t resilient enough to handle it, even though their cardiovascular system and skills are NBA-ready.
We’re essentially running a 15-year uncontrolled experiment on an entire generation of basketball players, and the NBA injury data might be showing us the results. The footwear industry has been so focused on performance gains and marketing that nobody’s really asking “what does this do to a developing athlete’s body over time?” How I’d love to see the media pick up this part of the injury ecosystem and start pressing the relationship.
And for what it’s worth – people inside the industry have absolutely noticed. This isn’t trend data anymore, it’s a pattern that’s raising serious questions internally. But good luck getting any brand to publicly admit their flagship performance tech might be contributing to long-term injury risk.
Not saying we go back to Chuck Taylors, but this needs way more research and honest conversation than it’s getting.
Think of the children, Steve!
Many options. Less games, but they’ll never do it bc revenue. Allow resting, but won’t bc load management/fans want to see players. No back to backs, but they’ll have to stretch the season. Play less minutes and more bench guys.
Expand the rosters, start to move towards having more hockey-style lines? Not sure if players or owners would go for it but it sorta feels like we’re at a breaking point
I wish there was like a 65 game season and abolish Thursday Night Football but capitalism wouldn’t allow for that.
Yes, anyone who watches a game from 20 years ago and compares it to a 2025 game can tell the speed of the game is completely different. Guys are running for longer, faster and with more explosive changes of directions. The load on their legs is way higher than previous eras.
I’m not a doctor but have speculated this already. So many teams want to run and play fast. There are so many actions now in modern day offenses. Kids coming to through aau playing much more before getting to NBA. Similar to pitchers in MLB an arms being so overworked as they need tommy john surgery earlier
There’s no need for back to backs
Cut the season to 60 games
All star break in between
I’d rather have 60 quality games than what we get now
82 is an unusual number anyway
But I know it’ll never happen. Too much money
This is something the old heads can’t seem to grasp.
“The league was tougher then. Today’s players wouldn’t survive”.
The increase in pace, lateral movement and strain on players’ bodies today FAR exceeds the occasional Laimbeer elbow.
Bit of irony that the new pace is the result of him, Curry, and the Warriors. A narrative during the their first championship run was that three point shootings teams can’t win in the playoffs. They stretched the floor like no one else was doing, and now everyone is zipping across the court the whole game like Steph.
It has nothing to do with the fact that all his best players are over 35
Check out Gary Vitti’s read on this. He worked with the Lakers from the Showtime Era through the Kobe era:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sjTU0xQLdRE](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sjTU0xQLdRE)
The man knows his shit, and it’s not something simple. Rather, several key factors are at play, including how players of today start readying for the game from early childhood until entering the league.
They play to fast and dont practice at game speed anymore so their bodies are not use to it anymore.
Back to back games are terrible.
But they fuxking get paid millions. Who da fuk cares ? And their career is playing basketball. Playing away games and receiving per diem, chauffeured and not driving or even making a bed. That’s half their work schedule. Do not feel sorry for professional athletes. They chose their career.
NBA needs better bench players and should look at how NHL does their rotations. But really boils down to the bench, the top teams have a great bench where everyone plays. Bench players could get more minutes and that would help lessen the injury risk overall. All of us here know someone on our team that should be getting more minutes and someone starting who should have less,
So spread minutes out more?
force teams to use all 12 players in each half like the pee wee league near me does.