{"id":136136,"date":"2025-04-25T07:00:09","date_gmt":"2025-04-25T11:00:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/?p=136136"},"modified":"2025-04-25T07:00:09","modified_gmt":"2025-04-25T11:00:09","slug":"butlers-deep-glute-muscle-contusion-an-opportunity-for-kuminga","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/2025\/04\/25\/butlers-deep-glute-muscle-contusion-an-opportunity-for-kuminga\/","title":{"rendered":"Butler\u2019s Deep Glute Muscle Contusion An Opportunity For Kuminga"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">NBA fans got a <a  href=\"https:\/\/www.basketball-reference.com\/players\/b\/butleji01.html\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Jimmy Butler<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/2025\/04\/25\/warriors-jimmy-butler-game-3-injury-update\/\" target=\"_self\">injury update<\/a> on Thursday night. Shams Charania reported that Butler suffered a deep glute muscle contusion and he could be at risk of missing Game 3. The fact that there is no major damage is positive news for the Warriors, but if Butler even misses one game, the Warriors will sorely miss him. Butler\u2019s deep glute muscle contusion does present an interesting opportunity for one player however. <a  href=\"https:\/\/www.basketball-reference.com\/players\/k\/kuminjo01.html\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Jonathan Kuminga<\/a> may have a chance at reclaiming his old spot in the <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/2025\/04\/14\/implications-of-jonathan-kumingas-dnp\/\" target=\"_self\">Warriors lineup<\/a> if he can step up while Butler is limited or absent.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<h2><strong>Butler\u2019s Deep Glute Muscle Contusion An Opportunity For Kuminga<\/strong><\/h2>\n<h3><strong>The Impact of Butler\u2019s Injury\u00a0<\/strong><\/h3>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"550\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Golden State&#39;s Jimmy Butler has been diagnosed with a deep glute muscle contusion and his status for Game 3 against the Houston Rockets is in serious jeopardy, league sources tell ESPN. This is best case because MRI showed Butler avoided any fracture or structural damage. <a  href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/nTEjv4QKp7\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">pic.twitter.com\/nTEjv4QKp7<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&mdash; Shams Charania (@ShamsCharania) <a  href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/ShamsCharania\/status\/1915595079244251390?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">April 25, 2025<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It seems like the Warriors may have dodged a bullet with the most recent Butler injury update. Charania is reporting that their is no fracture or structural damage as a result of Butler\u2019s big fall in Game 2. Butler is however in danger of missing Saturday\u2019s Game 3, and that could mean big trouble for the Warriors.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Without him, they failed to even score 100 points against the Rockets, and their offense looked stagnant and undermanned. If Butler&#8217;s deep glute muscle contusion causes him to miss a game or two, the Warriors are going to need to find offensive production and defensive contributions from elsewhere. That\u2019s where Kuminga comes in.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<h3><strong>Kuminga\u2019s Fall From Grace<\/strong><\/h3>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Kuminga has pretty much fallen completely out of the rotation. Even though he finished the season as the team\u2019s <\/span><a  href=\"https:\/\/www.espn.com\/nba\/team\/stats\/_\/name\/gs\/season\/2025\/seasontype\/2\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">third leading scorer,<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> the Warriors\u2019 coaching staff has been benching him over the last few games of the season and playoffs. Kuminga\u2019s lack of basketball IQ and defensive instinct has landed him in the doghouse despite showing tons of promise on the offensive end.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Kuminga did get some run during Game 2. After Butler and <a  href=\"https:\/\/www.basketball-reference.com\/players\/p\/podzibr01.html\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Brandin Podziemski<\/a> went out, he got playing time but looked rusty and a bit out of sorts. He ended up with 11 points on 4-of-12 shooting with three rebounds and two assists. It was Kuminga\u2019s first appearance since April 11 against the Trail Blazers. Although he wasn\u2019t his best self in his return to the lineup, the Warriors may be forced to use Kuminga again while Butler recovers.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<h3><strong>An Opportunity Arises\u00a0<\/strong><\/h3>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Butler\u2019s deep glute muscle contusion could be a blessing in disguise for Kuminga. The Warriors are going to need more size and scoring if Butler misses time. Kuminga is the obvious choice to step back into the lineup. After all, he averaged 15.3 points and 4.6 rebounds a game this season. If Kuminga does get the opportunity, he needs to take advantage of it.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">If Kuminga can regain his confidence and pick up his intensity, he could be a real asset for the Warriors in their series against the Rockets. The Warriors could use his point of attack defense and rebounding on the defensive end. They are severely undersized against the Rockets two-big man lineup and Kuminga could help them.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In the end, it may be up to Kuminga. If he can lock in on defense and provide sparks of smart offensive playmaking, the Warriors\u2019 coaching staff will be forced to play him. With Butler potentially missing time they may be forced to play him regardless.<\/span><\/p>\n<p>Photo credit: \u00a9 Troy Wayrynen-Imagn Images<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>NBA fans got a Jimmy Butler injury update on Thursday night. Shams Charania reported that Butler suffered a deep glute muscle contusion and he could be at risk of missing Game 3. The fact that there is no major damage is positive news for the Warriors, but if Butler even misses one game, the Warriors [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5284,"featured_media":136168,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"no","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1608,25,62,3],"tags":[50041,48978,142,4297],"class_list":["post-136136","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-basketball","category-warriors","category-nba","category-news","tag-2025-nba-playoffs","tag-brandin-podziemski","tag-jimmy-butler","tag-jonathan-kuminga"],"modified_by":"Kenny Kluska","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/136136","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5284"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=136136"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/136136\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":136169,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/136136\/revisions\/136169"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/136168"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=136136"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=136136"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=136136"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}