{"id":494124,"date":"2026-02-21T07:01:08","date_gmt":"2026-02-21T07:01:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/494124\/"},"modified":"2026-02-21T07:01:08","modified_gmt":"2026-02-21T07:01:08","slug":"deandre-hunter-undergoes-season-ending-eye-surgery","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/494124\/","title":{"rendered":"De’Andre Hunter Undergoes Season-Ending Eye Surgery"},"content":{"rendered":"

7:30 pm:\u00a0Hunter actually underwent surgery on Friday afternoon, the Kings announced in a press release. His left eye was reevaluated this morning due to the ongoing iritis, and he was diagnosed with a detached retina, which led to the procedure. Hunter is expected to make a full recovery and an update on his status will be provided in eight weeks, per the team.<\/p>\n

\"\"4:49 pm: The Kings will be without De\u2019Andre Hunter<\/a> for the remainder of the 2025\/26 season, according to NBA insider Chris Haynes and Marc Stein of The Stein Line, who report (via Twitter<\/a>) that the veteran forward will undergo eye surgery.<\/p>\n

Sean Cunningham of NBC Sacramento confirms the news (Twitter link<\/a>).<\/p>\n

Hunter, Sacramento\u2019s lone acquisition ahead of the trade deadline<\/a>, suffered an eye injury in his second game as a King. He missed the team\u2019s last three games before the All-Star break due to left eye iritis<\/a> (inflammation of the iris).<\/p>\n

The 28-year-old seemed to be on the verge of returning after the break, as he was a full participant in Wednesday\u2019s practice. However, he missed Thursday\u2019s loss to Orlando \u2014 Sacramento\u2019s 15th straight defeat \u2014 and now will be out for the team\u2019s final 25 games of the season.<\/p>\n

Hunter is the third highly-paid member of the Kings who is done for the season, joining Domantas Sabonis<\/a> (knee surgery<\/a>) and Zach LaVine<\/a> (hand surgery). The Kings are just 12-45, the worst record in the NBA.<\/p>\n

The fourth overall pick in the 2019 draft, Hunter spent his first five-and-a-half seasons with Atlanta prior to being traded to Cleveland last year. While he played well with the Cavs down the stretch of \u201924\/25, he struggled with his outside shot this season, and the team sent him to the Kings earlier this month in a three-team deal<\/a> which saw Cleveland acquire Keon Ellis<\/a> and Dennis Schr\u00f6der<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Hunter appeared in 45 games this season, averaging 13.7 points, 4.1 rebounds and 2.0 assists in 26.1 minutes per contest. His shooting line was .415\/.305\/.867.<\/p>\n

Hunter, who makes $23.3MM this season, is under contract through \u201926\/27. He will earn $24.9MM next season ahead of free agency.<\/p>\n

As cap expert Yossi Gozlan observes (via Twitter<\/a>), the Kings will soon qualify for a hardship exception<\/a> with Hunter, Sabonis, LaVine and Dylan Cardwell<\/a> (left ankle sprain) all out for an extended period. They also have a standard roster opening as well as a two-way vacancy after promoting<\/a> Cardwell.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"7:30 pm:\u00a0Hunter actually underwent surgery on Friday afternoon, the Kings announced in a press release. His left eye…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":494125,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[574],"tags":[64,63,726,62607,85],"class_list":["post-494124","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-basketball","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-basketball","tag-deandre-hunter","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/494124","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=494124"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/494124\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/494125"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=494124"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=494124"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=494124"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}