For the second time in two years, the Oklahoma City Thunder have been placed under a microscope. The NBA has reportedly opened an investigation into the reigning NBA champions for the skeleton crew they had in their 116-106 loss to the San Antonio Spurs on Feb. 4.

In a season plagued by injuries, the Thunder went with their C squad as they almost pulled off the upset. 10 of their 15 standard roster players were out. That meant OKC only had eight guys suit up — five end-of-bench guys and its three two-way players.

Advertisement

The Thunder hit rock bottom with their injury situation. Shai Gilgeous-Alexander (abdominal strain) was out. Chet Holmgren (back spasms) was out. Isaiah Hartenstein (eye corneal abrasion) was out. Lu Dort (patellofemoral joint inflammation) was out. Jalen Williams (hamstring strain) was out. Ajay Mitchell (abdominal strain) was out. Alex Caruso (adductor injury management) was out. Ousmane Dieng (not with team) was out. Nikola Topic (testicular surgery) was out. Thomas Sorber (torn ACL) was out.

The NBA was probably ticked off that the Thunder punted the national TV game. They were on the second night of a home-and-road back-to-back. They blew out the Orlando Magic in a 128-92 win on Feb. 3, where most of those names suited up.

Let’s break it down one-by-one to save the NBA investigators some time.

Gilgeous-Alexander, Williams, Mitchell, Topic and Sorber have all missed multiple games with their designated injuries. Holmgren, Dort and Caruso have dealt with those nagging injuries all season. Hartenstein had his eye swollen from the night before. Dieng was traded earlier in the day.

Advertisement

The only guys you can somewhat argue in good faith that sat out were Holmgren, Dort and Caruso. But as I said, they’ve all missed time with those injury designations. In a regular-season marathon, you can’t honestly expect smart front offices to push their guys in trivial matchups when the NBA playoffs are right around the corner.

We’ll see what the investigation brings up, but the Thunder didn’t break any written or unwritten rules. This feels like a waste of time. There are more dire situations to look at if you want to get upset about teams punting games — ala the Utah Jazz in recent days.

This article originally appeared on OKC Thunder Wire: Report: NBA to investigate Thunder over injury absences in recent game