The Truth about The Knee

[Green Bandwagon Note: I enjoyed this FanPost tremendously and it definitely belongs on the front page. Don't even get me started on the whole Phil Jackson thing right now. Granted that's what he has to do. He can't glorify one of the other team's best players.  But Pierce is a legitimately tough dude. As a side note I had an extensive injury history in my past. I've had things pop and had surgery. I've had things pop and been fine. Hopefully Pierce ends up with the latter.]

ESPN certainly has its good and bad points.  One positive is the injury information they provide.  Today there's an interesting article by Stephania Bell, an "injury expert" at ESPN.com.  Bell discusses Paul Pierce's knee injury and what it could mean going forward.  I don't have a medical background, but I think this provides some quality information about the potential severity and how it could affect Pierce's game.

The pop

A pop in the knee often suggests ligament damage and/or injury to the meniscus, a fibrocartilage disc (of which there are two, one medial and one lateral) in the knee that helps cushion the joint.  The body has some natural self-protective mechanisms built in for the knee, including preventing an individual from putting full weight through the leg immediately after significant injury so as to prevent further damage to the joint structures.

So even if the injury ends up not being all that serious, it's certainly reasonable to see why Pierce might be concerned and not wanting to put weight on the knee.  Phil Jackson seemed to openly mock the whole thing and even if Pierce is fine the rest of the way, I can't see any reason PIerce would go overboard on the drama with something like this.

Pierce's return

With a sleeve to offer some support, a still-warm (and therefore not so stiff) knee and the aforementioned anxiety-producing adrenaline now serving to override the pain, Pierce could, and did, return to the game to finish it out effectively.

You always hear crazy stories about athletes playing with broken bones and blown out knees for a short while and I would imagine that was the case here if this proves to be a serious injury.

Game 2 and beyond

The concerns...going forward are how much swelling he develops in the knee (especially overnight when the knee is immobile) and how stiff and painful the knee is in the next two to three days (which will be influenced by the amount of swelling) . . . If the swelling is significant, Pierce will have difficulty with the range of motion in his knee, and his ability to contract his quadriceps muscle -- the large muscle on the front of the thigh necessary for running and jumping -- will be impaired . . . f indeed he has injured the meniscus, it can catch or lock within the joint, not only becoming a source of irritation but also limiting his extremes of motion and hindering his ability to twist and pivot.

There is a lot more detail in the article, but I thought this was the important stuff to take away from it.  Pierce apparently didn't practice today and I'd imagine aside from seeing what progress he's made tomorrow, he won't be practicing a whole lot prior to game 2.

All I have to say is thank the lord and ABC for the stupid tv schedule.