Report: Butler diagnosed with torn meniscus, weighing treatment options

Minnesota Timberwolves swingman Jimmy Butler avoided the worst, but he's still due to miss some time after an MRI on Saturday revealed a meniscal injury in his right knee, the team announced. There is no timetable for his return.

The Timberwolves didn't specify the extent of the injury, but sources told Yahoo's Shams Charania that it's a torn meniscus, and that Butler is determining treatment options.

Butler suffered the injury in the third quarter against the Houston Rockets on Friday night, on a low-impact play in which he bumped knees with Ryan Anderson. Given his immediate reaction, and his inability to walk off the floor under his own power, it appeared possible the four-time All-Star had torn his ACL.

A meniscus tear is a comparative relief for Minnesota, but it could still keep him out until the start of the postseason, and possibly longer depending on the severity of the tear. The Wolves are currently fourth in the Western Conference, but their playoff position isn't nearly as secure as that seeding suggests. They're just two games out of eighth, and just three games up on the ninth-place Los Angeles Clippers. Meanwhile, the Wolves been outscored by 8.7 points per 100 possessions without Butler on the floor this season, a net rating that would be worse than any team's outside the Kings' and Suns'.

Nor is that simply reflective of the fact that Butler plays most of his minutes with Minnesota's other stars. In the 220 minutes Karl-Anthony Towns and Andrew Wiggins have shared the floor this season without Butler, the Wolves have a minus-11.3 net rating and an unfathomably terrible 127.1 defensive rating - which is 16.4 points per 100 worse than the Suns' league-worst unit.

The Wolves may have dodged a bullet, but they're about to get a serious gut check.