Tyrese Haliburton - has there been a severe injury as badly timed and with longterm impact like his?

The Game Room
1

For those unaware:

The Indiana pacers were underdogs through much of the playoffs and yet, they made it to the NBA finals. They got the series tied 3-3 and the big game 7 arrived. Winner takes all.

In the first half, they were very close, effectively a tied game.

Tyrese Haliburton, star of the Pacers, tore his Achilles tendon and not only do the Pacers lose game 7, he is out…the entire next season, likely costing them their next big chance to go all the way.

I’m wondering what other injuries are as big as this, stunningly timed as this, and had longer term consequences.

  1. Game 7 - probably ensured them to lose the game(it was 50-50 at that point)
  2. Star of the Team
  3. Underdogs
  4. Out for the entire next season

What other injuries have been as badly timed and significant?

I’ll do a deep cut as a suggestion:

In 2008, China hosted the Olympics after requesting it for many years. Liu Xiang was the previous Gold Medalist in 110M hurdles. He was their most likely gold medal contender in Track and Field, an event China does not have the top athletes in typically.

Yep, tore his Achilles tendon and lost his chance to win a gold in front of a Chinese crowd.

It was pretty devastating for him and for China, but they did absolutely kill it in their home Olympics. This was just a big one they missed out on.

(and longterm, he returned pretty strong to hurdles, but never won another Olympic medal)

2

The death of Ray Chapman led to the practice of replacing dirty baseballs and the banning of the spitball and altering the ball in general.

3

Larry Bird thinks he could have played longer if Len Bias didn’t die. He was drafted, then died before playing.

Bird ended up having to remain the main star for longer and it wore him down quicker.

Of course, we have no evidence of how Bias would have done and how uninjured Bird would have remained.

4

You don’t have to go back that far. This year Jayson Tatum of the Celtics had a similar injury in Game 4 of the Eastern Conference semifinals. They went from being NBA champs to exiting early with a huge impact for next season depending on when he can come back, if at all.

5

Loach nailed it. In fact if he hadn’t posted my entire post was going to be: “Haliburton? Try Jason Tatum, ferchrissakes!”

6

Also KD in 2019 — Kevin Durant’s Achilles tendon tear in the 2019 NBA Finals prevented the Golden State Warriors from their 3-peat championship.

7

Tiger Woods used to be the most unstoppable, unbeatable, untouchable force in all of sports. He had the length of Plastic Man could make immensely risky sand and heavy rough saves practically at will. His focus was nuke-proof. He instilled abject terror in his opponents. His achievements were so phenomenal the golf press had to invent new names for them. (Remember “Tiger Slam”?) He won 14 majors in almost dismissively easy fashion and was on pace to absolutely obliterate all records.

And then in late 2009…he got into a little accident. “Minor injuries”, went the report. :laughing:(:pleading_face::skull:)