Utah Jazz's Latest Lauri Markkanen Injury Update Takes a Bad Turn

The Utah Jazz have been struck by the injury bug in a major way through the first 11 games of the 2026-27 NBA season.

And based on the latest injury update surrounding the status of star forward Lauri Markkanen, those injury woes won't be turning around in the right direction any time soon.

According to ESPN's Shams Charania, Markkanen has sustained a non-displaced fracture in his right hand, and will be sidelined for at least one month.

Utah Jazz star Lauri Markkanen has sustained a non-displaced fracture in his right hand and will be sidelined for at least one month, sources tell me and @BannedMacMahon. pic.twitter.com/UcXV8E9H4y
— Shams Charania (@ShamsCharania) November 11, 2026

The injury for Markkanen is an issue in the same wrist that he's seemingly been dealing with for a couple of weeks now.

Markkanen first suffered a wrist strain during the same game that Jaren Jackson Jr. went down with his MCL injury as of October 26th.

And at first, it didn't seem as if the injury would be forcing Markkanen to miss a significant amount of time.

Markkanen had missed one game with the wrist injury before returning to the lineup for four more appearances, and was then sidelined once again for Utah's last two meetings against the Minnesota Timberwolves and the Miami Heat, the latter of which he was even initially deemed questionable to play in.

But now, it's clear that Markkanen is now due to miss a much longer amount of time than expected. And according to KSL Sports' Chandler Holt, the injury to Markkanen's wrist is a different one than the strain he suffered earlier in October.

I'm told that the Lauri Markkanen injury is unrelated to the wrist strain; it just happens to be in the same hand.

The fracture happened in the Dallas game, and he will be re-evaluated in four weeks.#TakeNote | @kslsports
— Chandler Holt (@CHoltSports) November 11, 2026

A month-long recovery window would place his return in early-to-mid December, and he would be sidelined for at least a dozen regular season games, if not more.

Markkanen has played in eight games so far this season, averaging 18.0 points, 6.8 rebounds and 2.0 assists while shooting 38.9% from the field and 39.7% from three.

What Lauri Markkanen's Injury Means Moving Forward

The fact that Markkanen is now set to be out of the Jazz's rotation for a significant amount of time with his wrist issue now means that Utah will likely be stuck without four of their five typical starters until further notice.

Jackson Jr. remains in the middle of his MCL tear recovery. Keyonte George just went down with an ankle sprain over the weekend that could take him out for several games, depending on the severity. Jusuf Nurkic still has yet to play in a single regular season game as he's been recovering from his preseason foot injury.

Nov 10, 2026; Salt Lake City, Utah, USA; Utah Jazz Head Coach Will Hardy watches the game against the Miami Heat from the sidelines at Delta Center. Mandatory Credit: Chris Nicoll-Imagn Images | IMAGN IMAGES via Reuters Connect

That shorthanded outlook in the rotation sets up a difficult road for the Jazz to now navigate for the next few weeks of the regular season, as if things weren't already tough to traverse.

Utah is 1-10 through their first 11 games of the year, and has fallen to a bottom-five team in the league for both offensive and defensive rating.

So for now until further notice, the Jazz will be due to lean on the combination of Darryn Peterson and Ace Bailey a whole lot more than they expected to entering the season, along with a creative combination of veteran and young depth pieces.

And as for Markkanen, he's now forced to wait a pretty long time before he'll be able to step on the floor in a Jazz uniform once again––turning an already ugly season in Utah from bad to even worse less than 12 games into the action.

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