PHOENIX — Kevin Garnett has a posterior muscle strain and will be out of the Celtic lineup for two to three weeks.
Garnett was supposed to be examined Saturday afternoon, but, according to Danny Ainge, he was instead checked when he landed in Boston Friday night.
The injury is not considered serious.
Ainge said the initial decision to have him leave the Celtics road trip was designed to protect Garnett from Garnett.
"The biggest reason we’re sending him out of town is that he wanted to play in the second half (Thursday) night," Ainge said. "And he wanted to play against Phoenix (tomorrow), too. So we just decided the smart thing to do was to get his butt out of town to keep him from being tempted to play.
"I don’t think it’s a major thing at all, but we’re just going to be cautious . . ."
"It’s been off and on," Ainge said. "He said he tweaked it in Dallas (on Feb. 12) a little bit, too.
"He’s been playing through it and he wanted to do that again. But, again, we have no reason to believe this is major. He’d have been out there playing no matter what in a playoff game. We’re just being cautious with him."
Here's the schedule for the next 2 to 3 weeks:
This week:
Feb 22 at Phoenix 2:30 pm ABC
Feb 23 at Denver 9:00 pm CSNE
Feb 25 at LA Clippers 10:30 pm CSNE
Feb 27 vs Indiana 7:30 pm CSNE
Next Week:
Mar 1 vs Detroit 1:00 pm ABC
Mar 4 at New Jersey 7:30 pm CSNE
Mar 6 vs Cleveland 8:00 pm ESPN, CSNE
3rd Week:
Mar 8 vs Orlando 1:00 pm CSNE
Mar 11 at Miami 7:30 pm CSNE
Mar 13 vs Memphis 7:30 pm CSNE
As tempting as it would be to have him back for the Cleveland game, I'm actually hoping he takes it easy and sits out the full 3 weeks. I'd rather he get as much rest and rehab done as possible rather than risk further injury. We still have 16 games after the one's listed above for him to get back in the groove.
The team will manage without him. They may lose home court advantage in the East to LeBron and the Cavs, but that's life. Rondo agrees:
"I think we can win on the road," Rajon Rondo said. "We struggled last year in the playoffs, but we’re a team that went through it and we fought through it. When we had to get the wins, we got the wins. So we definitely want to get the homecourt but we don’t want to risk guys in the middle of the season by bringing them back when we’re not ready."