Brandon Boston Jr. may have had a lingering wrist injury at Kentucky

On the latest edition of the Bill Simmons podcast, Ryen Russillo took a short detour from breaking down the NBA Playoffs to chat about former Kentucky Wildcat, Brandon Boston Jr.

Boston came to Kentucky touted as the shining five-star recruit, guaranteed lottery pick, and would-be stud for the ‘Cats during the shortened 2020-21 season, but he never really got it going from the start. The entire team followed his struggles and it resulted in one of the worst years in Kentucky basketball history.

Regardless, the LA Clippers drafted Boston 51st overall (via trade with the Grizzlies) and made NBA history by signing him to a two-year deal, the first time a team ever granted a contract like this to a player drafted in the 50s.

On the podcast, the topic of Boston came up after Simmons referenced his surprising 27-point explosion against his beloved Celtics this season, and how after watching that game, he was ready to gobble up all of the Brandon Boston stock he could, jokingly stating he almost bought his basketball cards.

Russillo’s comments on Brandon Boston

Russillo said:

“We were both there for that game, and we were like, ‘My God.’ And so I went back and looked at the college stuff, and it was like, oh, he didn’t hit any shots. Okay? So I started researching a little bit more and even made a call [to some with the Clippers]. I go, ‘Whats the story?’

He said, ‘You have no idea. This guy works so hard. Everyone loves him. He’s awesome.’

I’m like, ‘Yeah, but he shot in like [20% and 30%] in college, though.’

[And he said], ‘Yeah, but his wrist was messed up.’

And I’m thinking, ‘Wow, what a score for the Clippers. Bad wrist; guy dropped [in the draft].’

The BS Podcast 5/9/2022

Boston’s wrist injury wasn’t a huge topic of conversation that year, but KSR did report it in August of 2020 just before the season started. The injury allegedly occurred during his time at home before school started, but at the time a source close to the team called it, “nothing major,” and thus the hard cast he sported was chalked up as precautionary.

BJ Boston has his left hand in a cast, per Joel Williams’ IG story: pic.twitter.com/pid8ThSqiJ

— Jack Pilgrim (@JackPilgrimKSR) August 18, 2020

Russillo implies, however, that his Clippers source thinks that wrist injury was a bigger deal than made out to be publically.

Maybe this wrist injury impacted Brandon Boston more than anyone thought?

Could this downplayed wrist injury have been the reason why Boston shot so poorly at Kentucky with a less-than-stellar 35.5% from the field and 30% from the three-point line?

Maybe.

The idea that the team’s star player could have been hampered with a nagging injury would definitely be the spoonful of sugar to help make the horrid taste from that season go down slightly better for UK fans.

Ultimately, we’ll never know the true extent of that injury, but Russillo and Simmons were quick to point out that Boston’s numbers at the end of the year weren’t exactly indicative of a guy who is prepared to go off for 27 points per game every night.

In his rookie season, Boston shot just 38.5% from the field and 30.6% from behind the arc, which isn’t too far off from his college stats. Perhaps it’s just a really, really slow-healing wrist.

The good news for Boston is that he is on a team that has shown tremendous confidence in his ability, and his work ethic is reportedly off the charts. Best of all, he is just 20 years old, so he still has time to evolve into the player that Kentucky fans and NBA scouts thought he would be when he came out of high school.

If you want to listen to Simmons and Russillo’s discussion yourself, it starts around the one-hour and three-minute mark.