Zion Williamson injury: Pelicans blame NBA officials for 'avoidable' finger injury but pundits disagree

New Orleans Pelicans executive vice president of basketball operations David Griffin has criticised league officials for the recent injury suffered by Zion Williamson.

Williamson is out indefinitely with a fractured left ring finger injury which Griffin said was “avoidable” if league officials did a better job of protecting the number one pick in the 2019 NBA draft.

The injury was revealed in CT scan on Thursday prior to the team’s trip to Philadelphia, where they lost on Friday night, and Griffin didn’t mince his words when commenting upon the reasons he believes it has come about.

Griffin said: “I believe he probably suffered the injury over a period of time. It’s a striking injury. It’s a blunt-force injury. He was being beaten on the hand over and over and over again. For me to tell you one time, I don’t think I can do that. I don’t think he knows one time.

“I’m really frustrated because this was avoidable. We told the NBA through every means available to us, through sending in film, through speaking to everybody in the officials department and everybody in basketball operations, that the way they were officiating Zion was going to get him injured.

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“And, quite frankly, he’s injured because of the open season that there’s been on Zion Williamson in the paint.

“He has been absolutely mauled in the paint on a regular basis to the point that other players have said to him, ‘I’m going to keep doing this to you because they don’t call it’.

“There is more violence encouraged in the paint than any player I’ve seen since [Shaquille O’Neal]. It was egregious and horrific then, and the same is true now.”

Pelicans coach Stan Van Gundy agreed with his boss’ with the assessment that his star man is singled out for rough treatment.

Van Gundy said: “Zion is getting killed on both ends every night and the referees let it go, too often. So this is what you’re going to have and we’re going to have to find a find away, he’s going to have to find a way.

“He certainly takes a lot of hits. We’ve been on the referees hard. I know I have been every game. I get the response that, ‘Well, how many free throws has he shot?’ and my response is always, ‘Not enough.’

“The guy gets hit all the time. In my opinion, he should easily lead the league in free throw attempts. The swipe-downs, the guy on both hands is just getting killed every night. The referees let it go too often. This is what you’re going to have.

“I don’t know if we’re going to have to have to fit him with protective equipment because they just let people whack at him as much as they want.”

Griffin also noted that Williamson, despite multiple frustrating calls which have gone against him and the team this season, hasn’t picked up any technical fouls.

That’s even despite multiple frustrating situations like the on against the Nuggets on April 28, when Williamson was apparently fouled by the Nikola Jokic on what would have been a game-tying dunk in the final seconds, denying the Pelicans the chance of victory.

The NBA’s Last Two Minute Report released the following day ruled that Jokic did foul Williamson, yet the player himself did not react in a petulant way despite the adversity.

Griffin added: “He’s been doing exactly what he was taught to do in terms of honouring the league’s rule around decorum. He was respectful to officials. He was having conversations with officials, using the language that the head of officiating told him to use.”

On NBA Gametime, though, the pundits were sceptical about Griffin and Van Gundy comments, and reckon the comparisons with the way Shaquille O’Neal (known as ‘Shaq’) was treated by opponents were grossly exaggerated.

Veteran analyst Isiah Thomas commented: “I don’t agree with them. This kind of whining, this kind of crying (that) he’s being officiated more violently, more physically.

“The Pelicans haven’t lived up to expectations. Zion is hurt, it is a finger, the hand is part of the ball. We all get broken fingers. There isn’t a player in the NBA right now that doesn’t have some chip or fracture as part of his fingers. That’s just how it goes so it’s not like he got violently hit or anything like that now.

“Nobody has been hit (as) hard since Shaq. Shaq was violently hit and I gave Shaq a lot of credit for controlling his temper.

“I’ve not seen Zion get fouled like Shaq was getting fouled, there’s no hack on Zion like the was Hack-a-Shaq. This is just ‘We’re having a bad season, my top player is hurt, I’m going to blame the referees’, so I don’t agree.”

New Orleans heads to Charlotte on Saturday night without Brandon Ingram (ankle), Willamson (finger), Nickeil Alexander-Walker (ankle), Steven Adams (toe) and Josh Hart: out (thumb).

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