Caleb Martin’s sprained ankle leaves Heat with new injury to monitor: ‘We’ll see how he responds’
The Miami Heat’s depth continues to be tested.
Already without three rotation players, the Heat lost a fourth rotation player early in Monday’s 119-113 Christmas win over the Philadelphia 76ers at Kaseya Center when Caleb Martin sprained his right ankle in the first quarter of the victory.
With Jimmy Butler (strained left calf), Haywood Highsmith (non-COVID illness) and Josh Richardson (low back discomfort) already out, Martin played the first 8:43 of the game before exiting late in the first quarter and heading back to the Heat’s locker room. He was then ruled out for the rest of the night.
Martin, 28, started his 10th straight game for the Heat on Monday. He’s averaging career highs in points (11 per game), rebounds, (5.1) and assists (2.3) while shooting 44.3 percent from the field and 37.9 percent from three-point range this season.
“Who knows?” Heat coach Erik Spoelstra said when asked for an update on Martin’s injury following Monday’s win. “You ask him and any player right now would say they’re fine. He sprained his ankle. I didn’t see footage of it. We’ll see how he responds.”
With the Heat missing four rotation players for most of the game, Heat two-way contract players Jamal Cain and RJ Hampton both logged double-digit minutes off the bench during Monday’s win.
“They gave us very good minutes,” Spoelstra said of Cain and Hampton. “They have prepared for that. It’s not easy for the players in their situation where you don’t know if you’re going to play. And most nights, you probably have an idea that you’re not going to play. But you still have to stay ready and things change so quickly in this league. No one knew that we would have a sickness and then J-Rich was a late-day scratch and then Caleb all of a sudden spraining an ankle. Those guys gave us some really good minutes.”
The Heat returns to practice at Kaseya Center on Wednesday before taking a cross-country flight to San Francisco to begin a five-game trip on Thursday against the Golden State Warriors.
While Butler, Highsmith and Richardson aren’t believed to be dealing with long-term issues, any time Martin is potentially forced to miss just adds to the Heat’s extensive list of injury issues.
The Heat already entered Tuesday with the fifth most missed games in the NBA this season due to injury at 91 games, according to Spotrac’s injury tracker. As a result, the Heat has already used a league-leading 16 different starting lineups this season.
“This group, we’re not making any excuses for any guys being in and out,” Spoelstra said Monday. “We understand what our identity is and what it takes to win and we’re working on our consistency to do it.”
Despite all the injuries and moving parts, the Heat (18-12) is on a three-game winning streak and has won six of the last eight games to stand six games above .500 for the first time this season. Miami entered Tuesday in fifth place in the Eastern Conference standings.
And the expectation is that Butler will be back soon after missing theplast three games with a calf injury.
The hope was that Butler would return from injury to be available for Monday’s matchup against the 76ers, but an illness set his rehab back a bit. But Butler is expected to return during the Heat’s upcoming West Coast trip.
“He’s going to go on this road trip with us,” Spoelstra said Monday when asked whether he’s confident that Butler will return early in the upcoming trip. “We have another day before the next practice, two days before we get to San Francisco. I really don’t know right now what the timetable is. We’ll have a better idea by then.”
This story was originally published December 26, 2023 at 1:19 PM.
