Coby White is completely pain-free.
The Bulls guard is running, getting shots up, and attacking his rehab without hesitation. Therein lies the concern. Calf strains lure the athlete into a false sense of security, and then all of a sudden, weeks in street clothes turn into months.
This is the crossroads where the Bulls find themselves with White.
“Just talking to the medical, here’s the problem: Like (White) doesn’t have any pain at all with what he’s doing,” Bulls coach Billy Donovan said on Monday. “He’s on the court shooting, he’s able to jog, but what ended up happening and what became a problem when we were playing competitively in practice were those stops, starts, quick explosiveness that maybe he’s not doing a lot of that in individual workout.”
They are of course trying to simulate that as much as possible in the rehab workouts, but with the pace the Bulls play at on the offensive end, jump ropes and cone runs only do so much.
White is still set to be evaluated in a week, but an evaluation is much different than being cleared. The plan will again be to ramp up his activity and get him back into full-contact scrimmages and then see where his timetable falls.
What can’t be overlooked for White is he’s still an unrestricted free agent at the end of this season. So as much as he wants to be back and the Bulls need him back, there’s still a business decision that carries a lot of weight in all of this.
So it’s proceed with caution.
“If he plants the wrong way or steps, that explosive step is what got him and then he felt the tightness again,” Donovan said. “You don’t want to take that to an extreme where you have him push through it and then he really misses a lot more time. It’s a real hard balancing act.”
League memo
ESPN reported that an NBA memo was sent out to all 30 franchises, focused on the best way to protect teams and players from the gambling risks that hit the league last week.
Portland Trail Blazers head coach – and NBA Hall of Famer – Chauncey Billups, Miami Heat guard Terry Rozier and former Cleveland Cavaliers player/assistant coach Damon Jones were arrested as part of an investigation related to illegal sports betting and mafia-backed rigged poker games.
The Bulls actually had their annual meeting about the dangers of gambling last week – before the news hit – but Donovan understood the league now taking a more aggressive approach to the situation.
“I don’t know what the league’s stance will be on what they want to do with the injury report and those windows where maybe some people have information on who will be in or out and that information leaking,” Donovan said. “That stuff got addressed (in the team meeting), but I’m sure there will be another follow up to talk to the guys in more detail. The meeting we had as a group – and everyone was in there – was pretty extensive and this was before the gambling stuff came out.”
Upward and onward
Josh Giddey has been dealing with a sprained finger on his right hand but opted to continue to try and play through it.
According to Donovan, it’s more about pain tolerance for the guard and he’s “dealing with it.”
