Nuggets Danilo Gallinari expected to miss one month with ligament tears in right ankle

Denver Nuggets small forward Danilo Gallinari underwent an X-Ray and MRI on his right ankle after spraining it against the Dallas Mavericks on Feb 26. He is expected to miss at least one month with a torn Anterior Talofibular ligament and torn Calcaneofibular ligament (lateral ankle ligaments) in his right ankle, along with a Deltoid ligament sprain (medial ankle ligament) sprain.

Davide Chinellato of La Gazzetta had Gallinari out 3-4 weeks in a Tweet he had on Feb. 28th and that news was confirmed today by Adrian Wojnarowski of Yahoo! Sports. The Nuggets have just 22 games remaining in their season, with five contests from April 2-13 to wrap up the season.

Hopefully he won’t miss the rest of the season, as he’s having a career year with 19.5 points per game, but we’ll see when he’s able to return to action.

Kevin O’Connor from SB Nation has a gruesome chart of Gallinari’s injury history throughout his NBA career.

Gallinari appeared in 59 games last season with the Nuggets and has appeared in 53 of the team’s 60 games so far this season. His back problems to begin his career with the Knicks and the ACL and Meniscus issues with the Nuggets have been the major injuries that Gallinari has dealt with in his young career. It’s never fun seeing talented players get robbed of portions of their careers due to injury, and Gallo has played through a rash of ailments.

Just this season, Gallo played through a bone bruise in his left knee and had recently been playing through a gash on the back of his shooting hand.