Utah Jazz: Favors to Return Wednesday According to ESPN Report

According to a recent ESPN report, Derrick Favors will indeed be active and make his return to the court on Wednesday night against Oklahoma City.

The anticipation has been nigh unbearable. We’ve heard whispers of Derrick Favors nearing a return for quite a while, with a report yesterday giving even more reassuring evidence as Favors returned to practice and was expected to participate in shootaround prior to Wednesday’s game against Oklahoma City.

But according to an ESPN report that broke Tuesday afternoon, Derrick Favors will indeed be active and make his return on Wednesday, presumably putting all speculation to bed.

The report also mentioned that Favors will come off the bench and be on a strict minutes restriction. This should come as no surprise given the amount of time that D-Faves has been sidelined. Speaking of his recovery and return, Favors said, “I don’t want to try to do too much too soon. I want to get back into a rhythm and get in shape.”

While it’s great to see Derrick understand the need to work his way back slowly and steadily, I can’t help but feel a bit nervous about him making a return on a minutes restriction.

He did the same thing earlier in the year, coming back with a minutes restriction in the second game of the year against the Los Angeles Lakers, and while that contest was arguably his best performance of the season so far, he definitely didn’t look like himself in the games shortly after as he appeared seriously hobbled.

Favors went on to appear in just 10 games after that before the Jazz training staff decided to shut him down. While it was exciting to see him back earlier than expected, it was extremely discouraging to see him out once again so quickly.

By no means do I consider myself more of an expert than the training staff, in fact that couldn’t be further from the truth. However, I simply hope that this time around the results will be different and Favors will truly be able to make a recovery and work his way quickly back into game shape. It would be a shame if this just continued to be an ongoing downward spiral for him.

Nevertheless, I trust in the training staff’s expertise and while we might not see much of Favors on Wednesday, the mere fact that he will be back on the floor along with his defensive presence and team leadership, should provide an immense mental boost for this team, if nothing else.

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And Utah will need all the advantages it can get against a formidable Oklahoma City team that is currently neck and neck with the Jazz for sixth place in the West. If the Jazz were to win on Wednesday night, they would officially surpass the Thunder for that slot. And the return of Favors should only help make that happen.

It’s been a tough start to the season for the Jazz injury-wise, but having Favors back in action will be a huge step forward and hopefully an indication that the arrival of a full-strength Jazz team isn’t too far in the distant future.