Kevin Durant out for season, will have foot surgery

Kevin Durant officially has been ruled out for the season by the Oklahoma City Thunder, general manager Sam Presti announced Friday.

The defending NBA MVP will have bone graft surgery on his injured right foot next week in New York City. His rehabilitation is expected to take four to six months.

Durant, the small forward who led the NBA in points each of the past five seasons, played in 27 games this season, averaging 25.4 points, 6.6 rebounds and 4.1 assists a game. But he never quite looked right on his foot after a Jones fracture delayed the start to the season.

The Thunder are 41-31 and in eighth place in the Western Conference, but they also are without power forward Serge Ibaka. This news means Durant won't be back for the playoffs, when the Thunder once hoped he could rejoin Russell Westbrook to push the team back into title contention.

Here's the full explanation from Presti:

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"As we communicated last week, Kevin was going to use this time to engage in consultation and evaluation regarding the persistent soreness in his right foot at this stage of his rehabilitation. As part of this process, Kevin and Thunder personnel traveled to two additional specialists this past week; Dr. Martin O'Malley in New York City and Dr. James Nunley at Duke University. These in-person consults were designed to further supplement the previous evaluations of Dr. Bob Anderson. Several conference calls and discussions amongst the specialist team concluded that, while the majority of the soreness in Kevin's foot was related to continued inflammation of the cuboid bone and would subside with rest, the evaluation process also determined that the Jones fracture of the fifth metatarsal, which had shown significant healing previously, was now demonstrating signs of regression.

"With the focus of this process being aimed entirely on Kevin's long term health and stability, it was the consensus of the specialists team, in addition to a collective decision by Kevin, his representation and the Thunder, that to address the setback of the fracture site, a bone graft procedure would be the most proactive and recommended approach. The bone graft is the standard procedure for the five to eight percent of Jones fracture surgeries that do not initially have success or experience setbacks sometime within the recovery period. While everyone is disappointed that Kevin falls into that group, we are encouraged that the bone graft procedure has historically demonstrated long-term health and stability.

"Dr. O'Malley will perform the bone graft surgery early next week in New York. He has extensive bone grafting experience amongst athletes and has been consulting on the case throughout. Kevin will miss the remainder of the 2014-15 season and is expected to return to basketball activities in the next four to six months."