Magic officially rule out Jonathan Isaac this season after 2020 ACL tear
The Orlando Magic officially shut down Jonathan Isaac on Tuesday.
Isaac will not attempt to return to the court for the Magic this season, the team said on Tuesday. At best, he will now get to play in their season opener next fall.
Isaac is still recovering after he tore his left ACL during the league’s bubble season at Walt Disney World in 2020.
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“First and foremost, the care of our players will always be our top priority,” Magic president Jeff Weltman said. “We have to remember that Jonathan has missed essentially two years. While it continues to be a day-to-day process for him as he continues to strengthen and condition all aspects of his body, we feel we have reached a point where it would be prudent to say that he will not play this season.”
Isaac went down during a game against the Kings inside the NBA’s COVID-19 bubble in August 2020 and had to be wheeled off the court. He had missed 31 games earlier that season with a knee injury, too.
Isaac hasn’t played since. When the Magic’s regular season ends — they are currently in last place in the Eastern Conference standings and won’t make the playoffs — Isaac will have missed 165 consecutive games.
Isaac, 24, has averaged 9.3 points and 6.8 rebounds in 136 games for the Magic, who took him with the No. 6 overall pick in 2017. He is in the first year of a four-year, $69.6 million deal.
With the Magic’s season nearly over, Weltman said it just didn’t make sense to try and get Isaac back on the court at this point.
“I understand this can be frustrating to our fans, but Jonathan has worked extremely hard and he is eager to return to game action, which is why we must continue to manage his rehabilitation with the big picture in mind,” Weltman said. “Quite frankly, we are just out of time to ramp him up to play in games this season.”
