Nerlens Noel Back With Mavs After Thumb Surgery

Nerlens Noel is back with the Dallas Mavericks after having thumb surgery three weeks ago.

In the first week of December, Rick Carlisle announced that Nerlens Noel would be out an extended amount of time as the big man was electing to have surgery on his left thumb.

On December 8th, Noel had surgery on his thumb as has not been with the team until recently.

Tuesday night before the game, Noel made his return to the Mavericks bench as he is still a ways away from being available to play.

“Come back firing” is interesting word choice for someone who, before the thumb surgery, was nowhere to be found in the rotation.

Prior to the surgery on the 8th, Noel had logged five straight DNP-CDs, including the infamous hot dog incident night where Noel went to the media dining room during halftime to get a hot dog, On the season, Noel has logged over 20 minutes a night just three times.

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In a season where Noel and his camp is betting on himself to earn a big pay-day this coming offseason, losing not just his starting spot, but his entire spot in the rotation has been less than ideal for the youngster.

On why he wasn’t playing prior to the surgery, Noel told me “I really can’t tell you…I really can’t give you an answer.”

So if you aren’t playing, then you might as well get anything that needs fixing patched up.

Noel went under the knife and hasn’t been with the team since this past week.

Rick Carlisle said pregame on December 20th that Noel had been around the team some but he was heading back to Cleveland for a check up. Now, he is back with the team looks to get his cast off in a week.

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It is unsure of his role when he returns or if he will be a member of the Mavericks past the trade deadline, but this is a good sign all around for Noel and the Mavericks.