After COVID-19 devastated his family, Karl-Anthony Towns announced Friday night that he himself had contracted the coronavirus.
The Minnesota Timberwolves star – who has already lost his mother and six other family members to the coronavirus – revealed that he had contracted the coronavirus just hours before they were to host the Memphis Grizzlies in Minneapolis.
That game was postponed by the championship, marking the 13th postponement so far this season. All but one came in last week.
Towns, he wrote on Twitter, is now isolating himself.
“I pray every day that this virus nightmare will subside and I beg everyone to continue to take it seriously, taking all necessary precautions,” wrote Towns on Twitter. “We cannot stop the spread of this virus alone, it must be a collective effort by all of us. It breaks my heart that my family, and particularly my father and sister, continue to suffer from the anxiety that accompanies this diagnosis, as we know very well what the final result could be. “
Towns, said Timberwolves basketball operations president Gersson Rosas, is one of two people who have returned positive tests within the organization in the past two days.
“For him to have to go through this … it’s heartbreaking,” said Rosas, via Chris Hine of the Minneapolis Star Tribune. “It hurts. Karl is the most important part of this organization. What he went through and what Karl Sr. went through is heartbreaking.”
Cities lost seven family members to COVID
Cities have suffered perhaps more than anyone else in the sports world in the past year.
The mother of the 25-year-old Jacqueline died in April of the coronavirus. Jacqueline, a nurse, was put into an induced coma – something that first prompted Towns to urge Americans to start taking the pandemic seriously.
He later revealed that six other family members, including his uncle and grandmother, also died from the coronavirus.
Of course, basketball didn’t seem very important to him after that.
“I don’t even recognize most of my other games and years that I played and how I felt back then,” said Towns last month, after losing a double-double at the opening of the season. “If I can be honest with you for a second, I mean, I don’t really remember or really care. I only understand what happened after April 13.
“Because you can see me smiling and all, but that Karl died on April 13th. He will never come back, I don’t remember that man. You are talking to the physical self, but my soul was long dead. “
Towns, who is in his sixth year in the league, has played just four games this season for Minnesota, while dealing with a persistent wrist injury. The first overall choice averaged 26.5 points and 10.8 rebounds per game last season.
The NBA postponed three more games on Friday due to the pandemic, bringing the grand total to 13 in less than a month in the 2020-21 season. All but one postponement occurred last week – prompting the league to introduce new health and safety protocols.
Despite calls from Towns and others, the pandemic is spreading across the United States like never before. The country registered more than 238,000 new cases on Thursday alone, according to The New York Times, and nearly had 4,000 new deaths. More than 4,400 people died on Tuesday, a historic record.
“It’s a lesson for all of us,” said Rosas, via ESPN’s Malika Andrews. “Basketball is a microcosm of society now … This virus is powerful.”
Towns then ended his post with a promise to the family.
“For my niece and nephew, Jolani and Max, I promise I won’t end up in a box next to Grandma and I’ll win this,” he wrote.
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