{"id":34313,"date":"2025-05-15T08:40:16","date_gmt":"2025-05-15T08:40:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/34313\/"},"modified":"2025-05-15T08:40:16","modified_gmt":"2025-05-15T08:40:16","slug":"okc-thunder-forwards-wrist-is-cool","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/34313\/","title":{"rendered":"OKC Thunder forward’s ‘wrist is cool’"},"content":{"rendered":"

DENVER \u2014 Jalen Williams<\/a> didn\u2019t need his wrist to be pristine. Just sturdy enough for the moment.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The breath of the Thunder\u2019s season<\/a> was suspended as he caught the ball alone in the corner. Barely over a minute to play. He flowed through his form at full speed without a body within 10 feet of him.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Wrist, be good.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Ask \u2014 and plead and ache and endure \u2014 and you shall receive. Williams drained perhaps the biggest shot of his life, a corner 3 to earn a one-possession lead in the Thunder\u2019s 112-105 Game 5 win<\/a>. On his trip down the floor, he screamed at his wrist like an annoying collect caller. What he shouted was \u201cprobably something not appropriate.\u201d<\/p>\n

Williams wouldn\u2019t admit to any trouble with his wrist. The same wrist he had a listed injury history with during the tail end of the season. It began in early February, when a \u201cright wrist sprain\u201d sidelined him a couple games. Then it resurfaced in early March, when he missed a forgettable win over the Portland Trail Blazers<\/a> with the same injury.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201c(Williams) obviously has been dealing with the nagging thing on his wrist,\u201d guard Alex Caruso<\/a> said before the series, \u201cwhich maybe doesn\u2019t feel great. But you\u2019d never tell with the way he\u2019s out there.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cI think that mentality of just going out and playing and doing whatever it takes to win \u2014 when your best players are your most competitive guys, everybody else has to fall in line.\u201d<\/p>\n

REPORT CARD: How Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, Thunder graded out in Game 5 win vs Nuggets<\/a><\/p>\n

At different points this round, Williams could be seen working out with variations of tape around the wrist. The moment he shared with a sensitive limb seemed to be a point of relief.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cAm I allowed to talk about that or no?\u201d Williams said when asked about the sequence, turning to the Thunder\u2019s head of communications, Matt Tumbleson.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t even remember that, to be honest,\u201d Williams continued, playing oblivious. \u201cI probably gotta look at a clip or something.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Williams\u2019 shooting has been rocky this round. He\u2019s enjoyed heights \u2014 32 points on 21 shots in Game 3 \u2014 and lows \u2014 10 points on 2-of-13 shooting the following game. He\u2019s made just 24.1% of his 3s. He\u2019s hit 44% of his 2s. None of it mattered when Williams stood alone with OKC\u2019s season on the line.<\/p>\n

These playoffs \u2014 inviting soreness and aches, bruises and sprains \u2014 don\u2019t take excuses well.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cMy wrist has been bothering me?\u201d Williams quipped, further leaning into oblivion. \u201cI feel great.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cMan, I\u2019ve had tape on so much (expletive) during the season,\u201d Williams laughed. \u201cNah, my wrist is cool. I honestly don\u2019t even \u2014 that was an out-of-body experience. I just remember hitting the 3 and it was really loud, and then I remember getting to the bench and (Jaylin Williams<\/a>) was yelling at me and I (heard) that ringing noise.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

For a moment, his wrist slipped his mind. He surrendered himself to a chaotic crowd. His eardrums buzzed. His shot was season-changing. It made him think about all the things he could do.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen it\u2019s loud in there, and you have that much energy,\u201d Williams said, \u201cit might make you do a backflip.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Could he if he wanted to?<\/p>\n

\u201cNo. I sure wouldn’t have tried up three.\u201d<\/p>\n

Joel Lorenzi\u00a0covers the Thunder and NBA for The Oklahoman. Have a story idea for Joel? He can be reached at jlorenzi@oklahoman.com or on X\/Twitter at\u00a0@joelxlorenzi. Support Joel’s work and that of other Oklahoman journalists by purchasing a\u00a0digital subscription today at subscribe.oklahoman.com<\/a>.<\/p>\n

REQUIRED READING: Shai Gilgeous-Alexander delivers in clutch as OKC Thunder takes down Nikola Jokic, Nuggets<\/a><\/p>\n

Thunder vs. Nuggets playoff schedule<\/p>\n

All times are Central Time (CT)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"DENVER \u2014 Jalen Williams didn\u2019t need his wrist to be pristine. Just sturdy enough for the moment.\u00a0 The…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":34314,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3783],"tags":[407,328,7,601,408,311,301,187,832,364,70,85,6,62,67,302,310,475,179,3966,3965,61,81,687,471,66,83,312,688,833],"class_list":{"0":"post-34313","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-oklahoma-city-thunder","8":"tag-alex","9":"tag-alex-caruso","10":"tag-basketball","11":"tag-blazers","12":"tag-caruso","13":"tag-city","14":"tag-denver","15":"tag-denver-nuggets","16":"tag-jalen","17":"tag-jalen-williams","18":"tag-national","19":"tag-national-sports","20":"tag-nba","21":"tag-neutral","22":"tag-news","23":"tag-nuggets","24":"tag-oklahoma","25":"tag-oklahoma-city","26":"tag-oklahoma-city-thunder","27":"tag-oklahomacity","28":"tag-oklahomacitythunder","29":"tag-overall","30":"tag-overall-neutral","31":"tag-portland","32":"tag-portland-trail-blazers","33":"tag-sports","34":"tag-sports-news","35":"tag-thunder","36":"tag-trail","37":"tag-williams"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34313","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=34313"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34313\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/34314"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=34313"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=34313"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=34313"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}