The NBA has a problem with soft-tissue injuries. Achilles’ tears, to be exact.
Three of the league’s biggest stars — Damian Lillard, Jayson Tatum, and Tyrese Haliburton — have all suffered the same devastating injury. And Haliburton’s injury came in the most high-stakes setting imaginable in Game 7 of the NBA Finals. It’s no longer a fluke. It’s a trend.
Achilles tears have quietly become the most ominous injury story in basketball. Eight NBA players went down with them during the 2024–25 season alone — three from the Indiana Pacers, the league’s fastest-paced team. Haliburton. James Wiseman. Isaiah Jackson. No team plays with more pace than Indiana — no pun intended — and no team has felt the consequences more directly.
Jay Williams sees the connection. And not just with the Pacers but with the league as a whole.
8 torn Achilles this season. Tyrese Haliburton is the latest.
The NBA is playing at its fastest pace since the early ‘70s — 108.9 possessions per game.
We’re chasing tempo, highlights, and algorithms… but at what cost?
The product is faster. But the bodies are breaking — and…
— Jay Williams (@RealJayWilliams) June 23, 2025
This season’s surge in Achilles injuries has sparked a wider conversation about where the NBA is headed.
Faster play means more possessions, sharper cuts, constant stops and starts, all of which take a toll. That’s especially true for players who carry heavy offensive loads while adapting to a game defined by full-court pressure, spacing, and an emphasis on threes. As teams chase speed and efficiency, the risk of soft-tissue injuries like Achilles tears is becoming impossible for the league to overlook.
Williams used Haliburton’s injury as a moment to zoom out. On Monday’s First Take, he laid out why he thinks this is part of something bigger.
“This pace and this year’s pace for the NBA — 108.9 — is faster than any other season since the early ’70s,” he said. “And eight Achilles tears this season that we just went through. To me, that’s not a coincidence. That’s more of a trend we’re starting to see with what’s happening in the sport… And it brought me back to that [Kevin Durant] moment. You know, we talk about that Game 5 against Toronto in Toronto, where we saw it. You talk about Jayson Tatum, Dame. I just think as it relates to protocols and as we have more pace and space, as we have more ‘expand the court,’ more 3’s, it increases the problem of soft-tissue injuries like this.
“I think the NBA’s going to have to find different ways, protocols, to minimize these types of things that are occurring. Because the trend is going up and up and up.”
Jay Williams on Tyrese Haliburton’s Achilles injury and the growing number of soft-tissue injuries across the league:
“I think the NBA’s going to have to find different ways, protocols, to minimize these types of things that are occurring. Because the trend is going up and up… pic.twitter.com/IVkA453GZV
— Awful Announcing (@awfulannouncing) June 23, 2025
Williams isn’t alone in raising the alarm, but he may be among the first to frame it so directly. He’s not saying the NBA should slow down or change the way it’s played. He just thinks the league needs to figure out how to better protect players when the game moves this fast all the time. As pace keeps ramping up, there’s got to be smarter medical protocols, training, and rest, or else these injuries will keep piling up.
If this keeps happening, the real question won’t be how fast teams can play but how long their best players can actually stay healthy.