Cedi Osman to miss Saturday’s game vs Bulls

The Cavaliers are off to an absolutely devastating start, and the injuries continue to pile up for a team that certainly can’t afford them. The team is missing Kevin Love, George Hill and Sam Dekker for the short-term future, and they’ll be without yet another core player on Saturday against the Bulls.

This tweet is a little misleading, given that Sam Dekker is Love’s starter replacement, but the picture is pretty bleak. Osman dipped out of the Cavaliers game against the Thunder early with back problems after tweaking his back after a layup attempt.

This will functionally mean more minutes for David Nwaba and more duel-center lineups featuring Larry Nance and Tristan Thompson. The Cavaliers don’t really have the ability to replace injured players right now, and they’re going to suffer in the short term.

Osman’s injury is especially painful for Cavaliers fans — he’s one of the few young players whose development matters. He could be part of the next good Cavaliers team if things break right, so any lingering injury would make the 2018-19 season even more of a slog.

Hopefully Osman will return soon. In the meantime, the skeleton crew Cavaliers will have to make do.