John Wall had problems sleeping the night before, as his heart and mind raced in anticipation of his Houston Rockets debut, a comeback from a two-year injury layoff that was delayed another week by an NBA-mandated quarantine due to COVID-19 protocols.
It had been 735 days, as Wall precisely pointed out after the Rockets' 122-119 win over the Sacramento Kings on Thursday night, since he had last played in an NBA game that counted. He had since underwent surgery to remove the bone spurs in his left heel that had bothered him for years, then another operation to repair the Achilles tendon he tore while recovering from that operation and been traded from the Washington Wizards along with a protected first-round pick for Russell Westbrook.