CJ Fredrick fights through injury to earn "Most Impactful Player" belt

CJ Fredrick scored just two points during Kentucky’s win over Arkansas on Saturday afternoon, both of them coming from the free-throw line. He missed his only two shots from the field — a pair of three-pointers, one in the first half and the other in the second. The redshirt senior saw the floor for just 15 minutes in a game where he was hardly the highlight of the Wildcats’ 88-79 victory against the Razorbacks.

But during the locker room celebration, he was singled out by the coaching staff. Assistant coach Chin Coleman announced Fredrick as the team’s “Most Impactful Player” while Oscar Tshiebwe handed him a silver-plated belt with “MIP” etched on the giant buckle. Not because Fredrick scored the most points (that would be Antonio Reeves and his career-high 37 points) or grabbed the most rebounds (Tshiebwe obviously won that category), but because he influenced the win in ways that don’t show up in the box score.

“The most impactful player, who you think got it?” Head coach John Calipari asked in the postgame press conference. “We don’t win the game unless CJ decides to play hurt. If he did not play we would not have won the game and he was hurt. And he played anyway. He was the most impactful player.”

What a way to finish the regular season. #GoBigBlue pic.twitter.com/5x4OzAq5ha

— Kentucky Men’s Basketball (@KentuckyMBB) March 4, 2023

Since Feb. 4, Fredrick has been dealing with a cracked rib that he suffered in Kentucky’s first matchup against Florida down in Gainesville. The injury occurred when he fell into a camera operator and landed hard on the floor. He continued to fight through the discomfort though, playing the rest of that game and the ensuing one against Arkansas on Feb. 7.

But the pain eventually became too unbearable for Fredrick to battle through. He would sit out two-plus weeks to try and heal the cracked rib, finally returning on Feb. 25 to play seven minutes in a dominant 32-point win over Auburn. Fredrick then was forced into 28 minutes of action the next time out in the Senior Night loss to Vanderbilt — he had to play as Kentucky was already without Sahvir Wheeler due to injury and soon lost Cason Wallace early in the second half with an injury of his own. It was later revealed that Fredrick’s rib was hit once again in that outing against the Commodores.

He’s still not close to being 100 percent, but the Wildcats are running low on backcourt options at this late stage in the season. Fredrick’s status leading into Saturday’s road win was still uncertain the morning of the game before it was revealed just hours ahead of tipoff he would give it a go and even take the floor as a member of the starting five.

While he played just those 15 minutes against Arkansas, every second was critical, if only to help supply Kentucky with some additional ball handling and on-court leadership. 10 of his minutes came in the first half, but three of his four assists came after the break. Fredrick finished with a team-high +16 on the stat sheet. He did all this while fighting against his own pain threshold.

“I said can you give us five minutes a half? He played hurt,” Calipari said of Fredrick. “When you do that you give up stats or you think you may not look good and all that stuff. But he gave us the minutes and I said the minute you can’t go you tell me, and in the end, he couldn’t go anymore. He said I’m done. But without him we don’t win the game.“

After he was handed the Most Impactful Player belt, Fredrick was as humble as ever — he actually offered it up as a team award. “We can give it to everybody,” he said. That’s someone who is playing for far more than just individual accolades.

Moving into the postseason, Kentucky will need everything it can get out of Fredrick. Wallace is expected to return by the time the SEC Tournament rolls around on Friday, but Wheeler’s status is still unknown. There very well could be another situation over the next few weeks similar to what happened in Fayetteville on Saturday. Calipari will certainly need Fredrick in those moments if that were to happen.

With nearly a week to heal up, here’s hoping Fredrick can come back and impact Kentucky’s winning chances even more.