Jalen Smith Exits Wednesday's Game With a Hand Injury
Status alert: Jalen Smith (hand) won't return Wednesday. - @UnderdogNBA
Jalen Smith is officially done for Wednesday night with a hand injury, which is exactly the kind of update that ruins a perfectly good Wednesday night group chat.
Underdog NBA broke the news that the Chicago Bulls forward will not return to the floor. If you were relying on him to anchor your fantasy frontcourt or cash a live rebounding prop, you are now officially holding a useless ticket.
Smith has actually been a highly effective rotation piece for Chicago this season. He is logging around 20 minutes a night and putting up nearly 10 points and seven boards.
That kind of steady production is exactly why the Bulls handed him a three-year, $27 million contract. When a guy is giving you near double-double production off the bench, losing him mid-game completely scrambles the rotation math.
His exit forces Patrick Williams to absorb the extra frontcourt minutes. That is a manageable temporary fix, but it becomes a massive problem if Smith misses real time.
The Bulls are staring down a brutal upcoming schedule. They have to survive matchups against the , Milwaukee Bucks, Toronto Raptors, and Denver Nuggets over the next week and a half.
Hand injuries for big men are notoriously tricky because, as it turns out, catching a basketball requires both of them. We will have to wait for the postgame medical update, but Chicago needs him back before this upcoming gauntlet turns their paint defense into a public park.