http://espn.go.com/nba/story/_/id/11688088/kevin-durant-oklahoma-city-thunder-fractured-foot

OKLAHOMA CITY -- Kevin Durant has a fracture in his right foot and will likely miss at least the first month of the season, the Oklahoma City Thunder announced Sunday.

The team says Durant has a "Jones fracture," a broken bone at the base of the small toe.

Thunder general manager Sam Presti said no specific incident caused the injury, but that it happened over time. Durant has not been given an official timetable, but will likely miss 6 to 8 weeks based on the typical recovery time for an injury of this nature.

"From what I've been told, a Jones fracture is the most common surgical procedure performed on NBA players as of late," Presti said. "It has happened enough so that there is enough of a body of work to look at an average recovery time."

Durant will undergo further evaluation and consultation over the next few days and determine then if surgery is necessary, although it appears likely.

"We're heading in that direction," Presti said.

Following practice on Saturday, Durant informed the Thunder medical staff he was experiencing an "aching" in his right foot. Durant participated in both the Thunder's preseason games thus far, playing a total of just 30 minutes.

"We're really fortunate that we're catching it when we're catching it," Presti said. "We are very fortunate that Kevin notified us yesterday and that we're kind of catching it on the front end before this became more of an acute issue."

Most recently, Durant played 18 minutes against the Mavericks on Friday, though Presti said there's no specific play to point to for when the injury occurred.

"Because it's a stress injury, it happened over time," Presti said. "The fact that Kevin mentioned it when he did is a real fortunate piece of this because if he had continued to play on it, it would continue to get worse. So that it was identified when it was identified, and that the pain, or achiness, was enough to mention it, is a positive."

Durant, the reigning league MVP who averaged 32 points, 7.4 points and 5.5 assists in 81 games last season, has played the most minutes in the league since 2007 (20,717). Because of the wear and tear, Durant decided to withdraw his name from USA Basketball this summer for the World Cup in Spain, citing need for rest both physically and mentally.

About to enter his eighth season, Durant has only missed a total of 16 games.

"Coming in to this season having not played USA Basketball, reflecting on that decision now, I think clearly, probably helped him a great deal, just the amount of stress he was able to avoid at that point in time," Presti said. "I think that brought him back in to camp in a good spot."

Presti said there were already discussions internally that the Thunder would try and reduce some of Durant's minute load this season. While he just turned 26, Durant routinely plays close to 40 minutes a night.

"I think that's certainly something that's been talked about internally," Presti said. "Hard to say exactly if that will change, but we were already accounting for that regardless. Whether or not there will be a significant change in that, that will be up to the medical department in terms of how we get him back on the floor and when and at what loads."

The injury is one that could be conceivably be played on, though that would only risk more severe long-term damage, and the fact it's October helps ease any thought of Durant doing that.

"He could be playing on it today, but he'd be doing further damage to it and eventually, we'd have more of an issue," Presti said. "So we need to be in position where we're thinking long-term and the long-term includes the short-term. I think that's important to recognize."