Hurt Me Soul: The Truth Behind NBA Injuries

When I heard about Carlos Boozer's hand injury yesterday, I went through the same reaction process that I assume many of you did. Initially, I thought about how tragic it was for those unfortunate enough to have picked him in early fantasy drafts. Next, I wondered if he had actually been beaten up by his partner. Finally, once I realized that tripping over a bag is too goofy to be a cover-up and came to terms with the fact that fantasy implications are, I guess, less important than real-life implications, my thoughts turned to how embarrassing this must be for Boozer! All the cool kids are out there tearing their ACLs or getting hard-won groin injuries, and here was Carlos, just lumbering around like a giant and falling over grounded objects that are too far away for him to see. Sad! He must feel like a real klutz, ya know?


The whole thing made me question the stories behind some of the other offseason injuries we've heard about. All these players claim to have been injured while training or playing, because that makes them sound cool and hard-working and whatnot, but I started to get the feeling that maybe some of them were fudging the truth, lest they be seen as Boozer-grade Bozos. So I started doing some investigating, and found some additional examples of players hiding the real clumsiness-related causes of their ails. Here's the breakdown of the real incidents behind the injuries:

Kendrick Perkins, knee: landed hard while trying to prove that he's taller than Nate Robinson even when kneeling

Rodrigue Beaubois, foot: went too hard during French folk dancing competition


Ekpe Udoh, wrist: Overzealous Cristal-pouring freak accident

Luke Walton, hamstring: Twisted the wrong way while trying to do mimic a Grateful Dead dancing bear

Andrew Bynum, knee: Slid hard into ground in to celebrate a goal while watching the World Cup

Eddy Curry, hamstring: (Insert eating injury joke here)

Mehmet Okur, Achilles': Victim of a vicious slashing incident after he told Asra Akin's husband that he, in fact, had the hottest Miss Turkey-winning wife