The Golden State Warriors were one of the oldest teams in the NBA coming into this season, so it's no shock that a recent statistic shows they are one of the teams in the NBA who have been hurt the most by injuries.
A graph shared on social media shows that the Warriors have missed an estimated nine wins due to injuries, which is good for seventh-most in the NBA. In some ways, it feels like a light figure given all the injuries the Warriors have had to deal with.
Warriors have (predictably) been burned by injuries this season
The Warriors lost Jimmy Butler to an ACL tear earlier this season, basically ending any chances they had at contending this season. His absence is felt in basically every loss. Stephen Curry has missed a lot of games due to various ailments and other veterans have missed time as well.
That figure is probably only going to increase as both Curry and the freshly acquired Kristaps Porzingis are both out with injuries, and neither has a concrete timetable for return.
Sadly, this situation was pretty predictable entering the season. While many were bullish on the Warriors given the way they finished last season after acquiring Butler via trade, the big stipulation on any optimism entering the season was that the Warriors had to stay healthy. They haven't, which is really not a shock.
So many of their key players are 35 or older. Curry is about to turn 38, Draymond Green is now 36, and so too is Butler. Their major offseason acquisition Al Horford is going to be 40 in June. They are an old team and they got older by trading away Jonathan Kuminga for the 30-year-old Porzingis.
The hope coming into the year is that the young guys -- Brandin Podziemski, Kuminga and Moses Moody -- could take a big step forward and take some of the pressure off the veterans. That worked for the first week of the season, but then it started to fall apart.
Instead, second-round draft picks like Will Richard and Gui Santos have impressed. Even undrafted guys like Pat Spencer have often been more impressive than the more highly-touted first-round guys.
Add it all up and the Warriors are a .500 team destined for the Play-In. At best maybe they squeak through and get one playoff series, but it's impossible to see them advancing to the second round at this point.
It would be frustrating if the injury issues were not so predictable and to make matters worse, every guy on the team is going to be a year older and even more injury prone next season. Father Time always wins.