When Alex Caruso addressed Grayson Allen’s flagrant-two foul on Jan. 21, he didn’t yet know he had suffered a fractured right wrist and would miss the next 20-something games.
In fact, at that time, initial X-rays taken that night in Milwaukee returned negative, leading Caruso, who called the play “kind of (expletive),” to think he had avoided major injury.
Addressing reporters for the first time since that night, Caruso said he had no lingering anger for Allen.
“I’m over it,” Caruso said Friday at the Advocate Center after practicing fully with the Chicago Bulls for the first time. “As far as the play and all that I can't do anything to change it. The only thing I can do is figure out how I'm gonna get better, how I'm gonna get the team better, how we can win games.
“The six weeks was pretty frustrating, just not being out there with the guys and seeing them win a handful of games in a row, lose a handful of games in a row. The emotions of the season go up and down. So for me, it was just about trying to compartmentalize all that, focus on what I can control and kind of just get back to hoops.”
Caruso said he never heard directly from Allen and he didn’t see Allen’s social media post describing the play and aftermath from his perspective. Caruso said it doesn’t bother him that Allen didn’t reach out to him personally.
“I mean, he is who he is, I am who I am, people are who they are,” Caruso said. “I don't know him that well. The only thing I know is from past history and instances, so that's all I can really go off of.
NBA
“I really don't know too much what you're supposed to do in that case and situation in the NBA, if there's unwritten rules about it. But I think people are who they are and you can't really change that.”
Earlier this season, Mitchell Robinson committed a flagrant foul on Patrick Williams that caused Williams to fall and tear ligaments in his wrist. Robinson checked on Williams during the game and later expressed remorse, although coach Billy Donovan, who ripped Allen’s foul, made a point to differentiate between the two fouls and call Robinson’s “a basketball play.”
Asked if he’d reach out to a player he injured with a flagrant foul, Caruso said: “I probably wouldn't just make that play to get to that point probably.”