It’s small potatoes in the grand scheme of things, but one trickled-down effect of Nikola Jokic’s injury is that he will likely now fall short of the NBA’s 65-games played minimum to be eligible for awards. That means that if Jokic misses 18 games, he won’t be able to win MVP, or any other regular-season award, and he won’t be eligible for any honors like All-NBA.
In other words, one of the greatest players of all time, having one of the best seasons of his career, may go down in history without a single accolade for the season, thanks to new rules that were put in place to combat load management.