Bulls' Patrick Williams will make his return Monday vs. Raptors after five-month absence

Chicago Bulls forward Patrick Williams has been recalled from the G League's Windy City Bulls and will make his return to the court Monday against the Toronto Raptors after a five-month absence. Williams injured his wrist in Chicago's fifth game of the season, had surgery shortly thereafter and has been sidelined since. Bulls coach Billy Donovan revealed that Williams had been cleared for contact last Wednesday.

Williams is 20 years old and in his second season as a professional, but he was the Bulls' starting power forward at the beginning of the season. In his absence, Javonte Green has filled in admirably and both DeMar DeRozan and Troy Brown Jr. have spent time at power forward on the second unit. More recently, Derrick Jones Jr. has played the 4 spot in big bench lineups featuring Tristan Thompson in the middle. When Williams returns, Chicago will immediately become a more versatile team and Donovan's staff will have more options when figuring out the playoff rotation.

Right now, the Bulls can use all the help they can get. They've lost eight of their past 10 games, just got Alex Caruso back from a wrist injury of his own and are still without Lonzo Ball, who has been out since mid-January with a knee injury. Chicago's defense has fallen all the way to 20th in the league, and its plus-1.0 point differential is 14th, right between Toronto and the Atlanta Hawks, both of whom would be in the Eastern Conference play-in if the season ended today. At 41-29, the Bulls are fifth in the East and only two games ahead of the seventh-seeded Raptors, who are currently slated for the play-in round. That makes Monday's game between the two teams essential.

As a rookie last season, Williams averaged 9.2 points, 4.6 rebounds, 1.4 assists, 0.9 steals and 0.6 blocks in 27.9 minutes, starting in all 71 games he played. He will once again be asked to play a low-usage role, but this time he'll be on a team that has much higher expectations.

Comments

Klay Thompson to sit out Warriors preseason games in Japan as Kerr says he needs more time to ramp-up

Klay Thompson may have returned healthy to the Golden State Warriors last season, but the scars from his two missed seasons are still quite visible. The Warriors played their first of two preseason games against the Washington Wizards on Friday and will play another on Sunday, but Warriors coach Steve Kerr said that Thompson will not be playing at all during the trip to Japan. "Just feel more comfortable giving him a little more of a ramp up," Kerr said before Friday's victory over Washington. "He's just not quite ready to play at this point just based on where, you know, we're so early in camp. We just want to be safe and make sure he gets a good ramp-up before he plays in games." Typically, so little time to ramp up wouldn't be a problem for a veteran in a preseason context. The games tend to be so low-impact and demand so few minutes out of a team's best players that they can safely jog through them. Stephen Curry and Draymond Green played 1...

Shaquille O'Neal says Dennis Rodman was his worst teammate: 'He was a great player, but he made it hard'

Shaquille O'Neal played for six franchises over a 20-year NBA career. That's a lot of teammates. Speaking on The Big Podcast with Shaq, the four-time champion and Hall of Famer revealed which one of those teammates was the worst. "Worst teammate? Dennis Rodman," O'Neal said. "He was a great player, but he made it hard. Like when you try to corral the guys together and the people above you [are] letting this one guy do whatever he wants. So we had to be there an hour before the game. He'd come in fifteen minutes before the game eating chicken and rice. While the coaches are talking, he would jump in the shower. Cold shower. Come and give you 15-20 rebounds." O'Neal played with some characters in his time. We know about his beef with Kobe Bryant, who we know wasn't always the easiest teammate to get along with, though Shaq has long expressed regret over the way he and Bryant handled their relationship as young superstars, and eventually, he ...

Kevin Durant injury update: Nets rule star out for home-and-home vs. Raptors, hopeful for return later in week

Brooklyn Nets star forward Kevin Durant is expected to return to the floor this upcoming week. Head coach Steve Nash says it just won't be against the Raptors, either Monday or Tuesday night in the team's home-and-home against Toronto. Durant has started doing more on-court work recently as he recovers from the sprained MCL he suffered in his left knee last month, and Nash is optimistic about his prognosis moving forward. The former MVP will not play on Monday night against the Toronto Raptors, however. "I think with Kevin he's been a great healer throughout his career," Nash said Saturday. "So the No. 1 thing is to get him back healthy and feeling secure in his health and his body so he can move and be free. When he's back, obviously he adds a ton to our team on both ends of the floor ... one of the greatest scorers of all time. And we also know he helps us defensively; he gives us more size and length. So he's a big miss for us, and whenever he get...

Crossover World

Search This Blog