Injuries suck. Period.

And understanding injury risk factors help us better design S&C and recovery programs to reduce the risk of injury.

With my background in basketball, understanding injuries for NBA players is of particular interest.

What are the most common season ending injuries in the NBA and what are the primary risk factors for those injuries?

Study: The Primary Risk Factors for Season-Ending Injuries in Professional Basketball Are Minutes Played Per Game and Later Season Games​

What did the researchers do?

Researchers identified all NBA players and their injuries from 2015-20 NBA season through public sources.

• Player demographics, basketball statistics, injury characteristics, timing of injury, and game exposures (GE) were recorded.
• Associations between player characteristics and occurrence of season ending injuries (SEIs) were analyzed by season.

What did they report?

238 SEIs were experienced by 196 different NBA players from 2015-20 NBA season.

The top 3 season ending injury rates by injury type are:

1. Knee (0.47 per 1,000 Game Exposures)
2. Ankle (0.26 per 1,000 Game Exposures)
3. Upper leg (0.25 per Game Exposures).

The top 3 season ending injury rates by position are:

1. Shooting Guards (0.47 per 1,000 Game Exposures)
2. Small Forwards (0.38 per 1,000 Game Exposures)
3. Point Guards (0.33 per Game Exposures).

Minutes and timing of season

• SEI was associated with more minutes per game.
• The timing of injuries show that players have a higher rate of SEI games closer to the end of the season.

Age, body mass index, and positions were not found to have significant association with season ending injuries.

What does this mean?

• The primary factors associated with risk of SEI were minutes played per game and later season games.
• Most injuries and missed games attributable to injury occurred from midseason to the end of the regular season.
• The most common season ending injuries are of the lower extremity.

Limitations Worth Mentioning

• Shutting players down → closer to the end of the season, teams may elect to shut down players to avoid exacerbation of ongoing injuries, especially if the team won't make the playoffs.
• Exposure to Injury Chances → more minutes played per provides more chances (more games and minutes) for players to get hurt.
• No time to return → injuries later in the season will likely be more “season ending” in nature as there is less time to return them.
• Skewed data → two of the years (2018 and 2017) skew the data to show that more season ending injuries occur closer to the end of the season.

Coach's Takeaway

• With the 3 most common season ending injuries being in the lower extremity (knees, ankles, upper thighs), it may be beneficial to give specific attention to those parts.
• Specifically, training, treatment, and recovery efforts should be focused on these areas.
• It may be beneficial to be more cautious as a player’s average game minutes increase and as the season gets closer to the end.