Victor Wembanyama #1 of the San Antonio Spurs has been operating more like a guard than a center of yesteryear. Has that contributed to his recently suffering a calf strain? (Photo by Ronald Cortes/Getty Images)
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Don’t have a cow just yet. But calf strains have just taken out not one but two more NBA stars. A left calf strain has left Spurs star center Victor Wembanyama sidelined for a few weeks. And a grade 1 right calf strain means that Memphis Grizzlies point guard Ja Morant will not be right to play for at least another two weeks after he left a November 14 against the Cavaliers game with soreness in that area.
Are Calf Injuries Getting More Prevalent In The NBA?
Of course, calf strains here have nothing do with baby cows being stressed out about politics or something else. A calf strain in this case refers to calf muscles in the lower leg being stretched or torn. Two stars suffering such injuries near the same time could be pure coincidence. But they aren’t the only ones struggling with such injruies. Portland Trailblazer guard Jrue Holiday, Dallas Mavericks center Anthony Davis and Spurs rookie guard Dylan Harper are all dealing with calf injuries right—and left—now as well.
Then there’s what happened during last season’s NBA playoffs. Boston Celtic Jayson Tatum, Milwaukee Buck Jayson Tatum and Indiana Pacer Tyrese Haliburton all suffered Achilles tendon tears.The Achilles tendon is attached to, guess what, the calf muscles. The Achilles tendon is where two becomes one, in the words of the Spice Girls, the tendons from the gastrocnemius and soleus muscles in the lower leg combine to form one tendon. And as I covered in Forbes earlier this year, Haliburton was already struggling with, guess what, a calf strain through much of the NBA Finals before tearing his Achilles tendon in Game 7.
If it seems like the rate of stars getting injured in any way is up this NBA season so far, it is. Ever since the 2023-2024 season when star players played in 87.2% of the games, that percentage has dropped to 82.6% the next season and all the way down to 67.6% this season, according to Tom Haberstroh writing for Yahoo Sports. He also pointed out that number of games missed by star players during the opening month of the season has gone from one out of every nine or 10 games to one out of every three. Of the first 12 games of this season, star players have participated in just 56% of them. Although not all of these absences have been due to calf injuries, calf injuries have still factored in prominently.
Are The Style And Tempo Of Play Contributing To Calf Strains?
If you are running around looking for explanations about what’s going on, one possibility is all the running around that going on during the games these days. The game does look quite different from it did back in the 1990s when defense was allowed to be more physical and many possession seemed to be more grind-it-out affairs with more post and mid-range play.
Today’s games seem to be more frenetic with a greater reliance on three-point shots, players spaced out more widely across the court and increases in the per game number of possessions and scoring (100.5 points per game so far this season compared to 88.9 in 1998-1999 season). And although the NBA has only tracked player speed and distance traveled per game only since the 2013-2014 season, these numbers have hit highs this season with the average speed being 4.43 miles per hour and the average distance per game being 34.3 miles.
Such changes may in turn put different stresses on different parts of the body. Running around and cutting more to get open to attempt a three point could in turn put more stress on the calf muscles. You contract your calf muscles whenever you point your foot and toes downwards. This motion is called plantar flexion. You do it whenever you plant your foot and then push-off the foot to launch into running, change directions when running or jump.
Are Changes In Player Roles Contributing To Calf Injuries?
Guard Ja Morant #12 of the Memphis Grizzlies, who is out with a calf strain, watches from the bench during the third quarter against the Cleveland Cavaliers at Rocket Arena on November 15, 2025 in Cleveland, Ohio. (Photo by Jason Miller/Getty Images)
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Another thing that you have to roll into the discussion is changing player roles. Positions on a court used to be more clearly defined. A center would stay around the basket both on offense and defense, focusing on rebounding, blocking shots and taking shorter, higher percentage shots. Power forwards would stay reasonably close to basket. Small forwards would roam more than the big men. Shooting guards would, huess what, shoot. And point guards would be responsible for bringing the ball up the court,
Nowadays, these positions are a lot more blurred. You’ve got centers and power forwards now handling the ball like point guards and shooting three pointers like shooting guards. These big bodied folks are playing more like smaller bodied folks with more running and cutting. The seven-foot-four-inch and 236 pound Wembanyama literally embodies this change. This clearly-would-have-been-a-center-in-the-1990’s is averaging close to five three point field goal attempts this season.
All of this could be contributing to calf injuries in different ways. Having all players move around more of the court could mean more running and cutting for everyone but especially those who are bigger and heavier. Bigger and heavier folks will in turn be applying even more force to their calf muscles whenever they plantar flex.
Are Players’ Pre-NBA Careers Contributing To Calf Strains?
You also can’t overlook the playing careers that NBA players have before they reach the NBA. I use the word “careers” because that’s what they’ve kind of become. From earlier and earlier ages, kids with star potential are being slotted into more and more professionalish camps and leagues that force them to specialize in basketball. I’ve already written in Forbes previously about the dangers of such sports specialization too early in kids’ lives and how the opposite, encouraging sports sampling, can help kids more evenly develop their bodies and skills to make them less prone to injury. You’ve gotta wonder what the wear and tear over the years may be doing to players’ bodies.
College basketball has fundamentally changed as well since the 1990s. It is now a lot more rarer for players to spend three or four years in college learning fundamentals and playing in 32-game regular seasons rather than 82-game NBA season from their late teens to early 20s. Could this be affecting player development and thus body movement, conditioning and other stuff that may be affect the risks of different injuries?
Are Shoes Contributing To Calf Strains?
Finally, consider that 1980s Nike commercial where Spike Lee as the character Mars Blackmon said, “It’s gotta be the shoes” when referring to what Michael Jordan was doing. Well, whenever you see any change in lower extremity injury rates, you’ve gotta wonder how shoes may or may not be contributing. Sneaker manufacturers have been touting new technology and designs over the past decade. For example, you can see more players wearing low-top rather than high-top sneakers probably to allow for more ankle flexibility with the increased running and cutting these days.
However, there is a potential trade-off. More ankle motion could lead to more calf injuries. But, shoe enough, more data is needed to determine how shoe changes may be affecting performance versus injury risk.
If basketball teams want to get a leg up on what’s causing these injuries in general and how to prevent them, it would help to have more studies and data. It could be worth the investment. After all, having your star player out with a calf strain would probably be the opposite of a cash cow.