tlongII
04-26-2010, 01:56 PM
http://www.nba.com/2010/news/features/david_aldridge/04/26/morning.tip/index.html?ls=iref:nbahpt1
http://i.cdn.turner.com/nba/nba/2010/news/features/david_aldridge/04/26/morning.tip/0426roy2608.jpg
Brandon Roy's return to the lineup in Game 4 wasn't as simple as just stepping out on the court.
CHICAGO -- The idea was to lead a great week of NBA playoff basketball with the story of how Mike Brown and LeBron James handle their partnership -- and it is a partnership -- in a manner that should be very comforting for Cavaliers fans. That was the idea. But then two things happened Saturday that squelched those plans. (Promise: Brown and 'Bron next week.)
One, the Thunder spanked the Lakers. I mean, spanked them. Not in the way we've become expected to see the Lakers occasionally in the postseason, when they've not been engaged mentally, like they were for much of last year's second-round series with Houston. Oklahoma City put the wood to L.A. on Saturday, winning going away, and it looks like the Lakers just don't have an answer for Russell Westbrook, the most important player in the series.
Maybe the Lakers wake up and put the Thunder away. But it's not a stretch to say the Thunder are two wins away from the greatest playoff upset in NBA history. Yes, bigger than Golden State over Washington in the 1975 Finals (the Bullets weren't defending champions) or Golden State (again) over Dallas in the 2007 playoffs. And Westbrook is the biggest reason why.
Two, Brandon Roy suited up for the Blazers in Game 4 against Phoenix, seemingly ignoring all rules of human physiology and history, and giving Portland -- incredible, irrepressable, indefatigable Portland -- a chance to advance out of the first round for the first time since 2000. This was an organization working together, trying to figure out the fastest, safest way to get its star player back on the court.
Let's start with Roy. On April 16 -- that's less than two weeks ago -- he underwent arthroscopic knee surgery to clean out torn meniscus cartilage in his right knee, after he'd injured the knee against the Lakers on the final weekend of the regular season. No one expected Roy to play in the playoffs unless the Blazers went deep into the postseason, and no one expected that. So most figured Roy was out for the rest of the season. (Roy did, too.) Every patient is different, of course, but the normal recovery time after an arthroscopy is four to six weeks.
Roy was back in eight days.
"I've heard of it in football," said the Blazers' longtime head athletic trainer, Jay Jensen, Saturday night. "I think Roger Craig played after an arthroscopy."
But basketball players? Well, it's different. They sort of need their knees working right. As Mike Singletary might say, can't run without 'em. Can't plant without 'em. Can't change directions without 'em. Can't shoot without 'em. Can't jump without 'em. Can't play without 'em.
But Roy believes his knee is just fine, even without all that previously-believed-to-be-necessary healing time.
He didn't look like a guy that was out like a mackerel the week before. He played 26 minutes and scored five of his 10 points in the final five minutes against the Suns on Saturday to help the Blazers even their series at two games apiece.
"Long story," Roy said Saturday night. True. But it's a good one.
When Roy hurt himself in the first quarter of that April 16 game against the Lakers -- Ron Artest stepped on his foot, pinning it to the floor, while Roy's momentum carried him to the right, until Roy felt something give way in his knee -- Roy immediately thought it was his meniscus. He had suffered a similar cartilage tear while in college at the University of Washington, in the lateral area of the knee. (Although Roy has good cartilage in the front of his knee, concerns about his knee were the reason some teams at the top of the Draft in 2007 were leery about taking him.)
"I went to the locker room and I was like, this feels like my meniscus," Roy said. "Unless we made the second round, I don't think I'm going to make it."
An MRI that night confirmed the meniscus tear, and surgery was set for the following Friday. But here is where Roy got a break. Team physician Don Roberts decided to take a different approach to the arthroscopy. Normally, three small holes are drilled into the knee and the surgeon then cleans out the torn cartilage. But Roberts opted to only drill two holes in Roy's knee, and that was important, because the third hole is usually drilled into the patient's quadriceps muscle. Not having to wait on that hole healing was a major plus for Roy.
"Going into the surgery, we had talked about trying to minimize the healing time, so if we got to the second round, Brandon could be available, or maybe for six or seven (of this round), Brandon could have a chance to be available," said Jensen, who was authorized by the Blazers to discuss Roy's condition. (Roberts has a long-standing policy of not talking to the media about his patients). "The hole is used for irrigation so you're able to see clearer. He did away with that hole. That helped with the healing time."
Soon after Roy awoke, he began telling Jensen that his knee didn't feel nearly as bad as he'd thought.
"I was flexing my knee and I said 'it feels pretty good right now,' " Roy said. He could flex the knee well past what the normal range of motion would be just minutes after an operation.
"He was coming out of surgery, so he was saying some goofy things, too," Jensen said. "I figured when he came home he'd probably change his tune ... He was already saying 'Jay, I can bend this thing.' He was on crutches but he pretty much got rid of those by the time he got home. He was going up the stairs on Friday (evening), which was unsuual. He hasn't taken a pain pill during this whole thing. He still hasn't."
Also working in Roy's favor was the nature of the arthroscopy. It was a meniscus shave, not an operation to repair a torn muscle or reset a broken bone. (It also helped that Roy is a quick healer; he played at Washington 11 days after the arthroscopy in college.)
Roberts "said a meniscus tear is not anything that we repair; it's something we clean up and take out," Roy said. "We just have to make sure that we keep the swelling down. Second day, the swelling was gone already ... I was on the court in three days. I went in the gym and said my knee feels pretty good. (Roberts) came in the gym because he didn't believe me. He thought I was just saying it. He came and watched me three days straight. Maybe this is a miracle."
Said Jensen: "He never had any swelling. Never. He started doing his rehab stuff, and by the middle of the week he was jogging on the treadmill. He was running at about 30 percent of his body weight at high speed. We put him through the paces. He never had any swelling, or any pain. Nothing. The only thing was his conditioning. We played 2 on 2 and he struggled. He was gassed. But Brandon said, 'That's not my game, anyway. I don't play 2 on 2 full speed. I pick my spots.'" (Jensen knew this was true; he regularly beat Roy in bike races the two had during the summer.)
Given this new information, and after Roy practiced Friday, the Blazers upped their prognosis. Maybe Roy would be back by late in the Suns' series, and coach Nate McMillan said he might be able to play in Game 5 Monday. But there was the matter of convincing management that it wasn't a gamble to put the team's superstar back out on the court so soon, even though the player and coach and medical staff were all saying, 'Go.' McMillan reached out to Kevin Pritchard, the Blazers' general manager.
"We initially said no way," Pritchard said Sunday.
"But I could tell both of those guys (Roy and McMillan) were spending an amazing amount of energy on this decision," Pritchard said. "I told them, go to sleep. I didn't want them to spend all of their emotional energy on this one decision. I talked to Nate. I could hear it in his voice that he had talked to Brandon and Brandon felt good about it. But I told them to go to sleep and let's all think about it.
"That night I spent a lot of energy thinking about it. What are the hurdles we have to go through? First, the doctors. They said it was the cleanest surgery he'd ever have. Second, was Brandon emotionally ready to play? There was no stopping that kid Saturday. Third is trust. When Brandon has been hurt, he's been honest about it."
Jensen and the medical staff argued that because there wouldn't be a lot of on-court practice time during the playoffs, Roy could use the games as his conditioning tool, to work himself back into game shape. But the decision had to go all the way to the top, to owner Paul Allen. By Saturday morning, the plan was still for Roy to play, maybe, on Monday.
But Roy had other ideas.
"I came in (Saturday) morning. I had worked out pretty good (Friday) night and Coach was telling me he wanted to wait until Game 5," Roy said. "I said all right, that's cool. But I'd been feeling so good, there was no way I could wait until Game 5 ... I said to my fiancee (Tiana Bardwell), 'Coach isn't going to let me play.' She said you have to keep pushing him."
Roy texted Jensen.
"He said, 'Jay, I want to play so bad. You've got to let me play,' " Jensen said. "'There's no reason that you shouldn't let me play. You believe me when I tell you I can't play. I told you with the hamstring (when Roy missed 15 games and the All-Star Game) earlier this year. I'm telling you the truth. You have to believe me now.'"
Jensen, Roberts and the team's other doctors signed off to Allen: Roy was fine. He couldn't hurt his knee any more by playing.
"I wanted Paul to hear for himself that Brandon was ready to play," Jensen said.
While Allen was making up his mind, Roy was in the Blazers' locker room.
"There was nothing further I could do about this," Roy said. "I had to go to the (pregame) meeting and wait. They had to decide if I could play ... I was in my shorts and my t-shirt. I went back to make sure that my uniform was there (in his locker). I was nervous, like I was waiting for my SAT scores."
Pritchard, McMillan and Allen went over the pros and cons one more time. This wasn't just more than $80 million of Allen's money in the balance; it was the team's franchise player, the face of the organization. It was not an easy decision. But Pritchard insists the Blazers didn't think about any short-term gains by playing Roy if he wasn't ready.
"Mr. Allen is probably the best fact-finder in the organization," Pritchard said. "He brought questions that Nate and I couldn't think of, and I think Nate and I thought up questions that maybe all of us didn't think of. We're not afraid to challenge each other. The best thing an organization can have is the ability to agree, to disagree, but to come up together with a decision. And this is a picture-perfect example of that."
Twenty minutes later, with the pregame meeting under way, Pritchard snuck into the locker room through a side door. Allen had signed off. Green light.
"He gave me two thumbs up," Roy said. "He said, 'Go get this win.' Nobody else saw it. We were going through our meeting and Coach was making his speech. I just started putting my uniform on."
With two sutures still in his knee, Roy entered the game with 4:06 left in the first quarter. He knew he couldn't go for 30, but he thought he could be a pressure release, move the ball, make the Suns pay some attention to him.
"We got bombed two days straight," Roy said. "I didn't know how well I could play, but I thought I could give the guys some confidence. They were playing like the world was on their shoulders, especially LaMarcus (Aldridge)."
He made his presence felt in the fourth quarter. The Blazers had a precarious 82-79 lead with five minutes left when Marcus Camby drove the lane and passed to a wide-open Nicolas Batum in the right corner. But Batum turned and whipped a pass to Roy, behind the 3-point line.
"I was like, 'Nic, what are you doing,?' " Roy said. "'You shoot it. I haven't shot it all night.' But he swung it to me and I said, 'Shoot it with confidence.' "
He did, drilling a three to give Portland a six-point lead. Two minutes later, Roy was isolated left of the key against Jason Richardson. Roy took a jab step, stepped back and drilled a 16-footer with 2:10 left to put the Blazers up 91-83. They didn't trail the rest of the way. He wound up 5-of-10 from the floor.
"I felt like I got into a rhythm," Roy said. "J Rich, he started denying me. But I started to feel good."
An hour after the game, Roberts removed the two sutures. There was no swelling postgame. The knee, by all accounts, came through just fine. Roy is now on a 20-25 minute limit, but even Jensen allowed that it will be difficult to take him out of a game if he's going good.
Roy heard that both Kenny Smith and Charles Barkley, on the TNT set, questioned whether he should be out there at all, that someone in the Blazers' organization should have saved Roy from himself, that any player worth his salt is going to suit up in the playoffs. Jensen wasn't thrilled with their opinions. "They were acting like we were knuckleheads or something," Jensen said. "There's a process that we go through to see if a guy can play. We went through that process.". Roy understood, but he wanted everyone to know that this was not a rash decision. He asked me to thank Kenny and Chuck for looking out for him.
"The only thing I'll say I had to fight everybody, from my parents to my friends, to the doctors," Roy said. "But I felt so good. I can cut. I don't think I can get 30 tonight, but I can play. I can contribute. I kept stressing that. I 'm not in any pain ... It's weird, man. I can't explain it. I'm just not trying to question it too much."
What a testament to this kid, whom so many thought didn't have the foot speed to play in the NBA.
His heart is plenty big, though.
http://i.cdn.turner.com/nba/nba/2010/news/features/david_aldridge/04/26/morning.tip/0426roy2608.jpg
Brandon Roy's return to the lineup in Game 4 wasn't as simple as just stepping out on the court.
CHICAGO -- The idea was to lead a great week of NBA playoff basketball with the story of how Mike Brown and LeBron James handle their partnership -- and it is a partnership -- in a manner that should be very comforting for Cavaliers fans. That was the idea. But then two things happened Saturday that squelched those plans. (Promise: Brown and 'Bron next week.)
One, the Thunder spanked the Lakers. I mean, spanked them. Not in the way we've become expected to see the Lakers occasionally in the postseason, when they've not been engaged mentally, like they were for much of last year's second-round series with Houston. Oklahoma City put the wood to L.A. on Saturday, winning going away, and it looks like the Lakers just don't have an answer for Russell Westbrook, the most important player in the series.
Maybe the Lakers wake up and put the Thunder away. But it's not a stretch to say the Thunder are two wins away from the greatest playoff upset in NBA history. Yes, bigger than Golden State over Washington in the 1975 Finals (the Bullets weren't defending champions) or Golden State (again) over Dallas in the 2007 playoffs. And Westbrook is the biggest reason why.
Two, Brandon Roy suited up for the Blazers in Game 4 against Phoenix, seemingly ignoring all rules of human physiology and history, and giving Portland -- incredible, irrepressable, indefatigable Portland -- a chance to advance out of the first round for the first time since 2000. This was an organization working together, trying to figure out the fastest, safest way to get its star player back on the court.
Let's start with Roy. On April 16 -- that's less than two weeks ago -- he underwent arthroscopic knee surgery to clean out torn meniscus cartilage in his right knee, after he'd injured the knee against the Lakers on the final weekend of the regular season. No one expected Roy to play in the playoffs unless the Blazers went deep into the postseason, and no one expected that. So most figured Roy was out for the rest of the season. (Roy did, too.) Every patient is different, of course, but the normal recovery time after an arthroscopy is four to six weeks.
Roy was back in eight days.
"I've heard of it in football," said the Blazers' longtime head athletic trainer, Jay Jensen, Saturday night. "I think Roger Craig played after an arthroscopy."
But basketball players? Well, it's different. They sort of need their knees working right. As Mike Singletary might say, can't run without 'em. Can't plant without 'em. Can't change directions without 'em. Can't shoot without 'em. Can't jump without 'em. Can't play without 'em.
But Roy believes his knee is just fine, even without all that previously-believed-to-be-necessary healing time.
He didn't look like a guy that was out like a mackerel the week before. He played 26 minutes and scored five of his 10 points in the final five minutes against the Suns on Saturday to help the Blazers even their series at two games apiece.
"Long story," Roy said Saturday night. True. But it's a good one.
When Roy hurt himself in the first quarter of that April 16 game against the Lakers -- Ron Artest stepped on his foot, pinning it to the floor, while Roy's momentum carried him to the right, until Roy felt something give way in his knee -- Roy immediately thought it was his meniscus. He had suffered a similar cartilage tear while in college at the University of Washington, in the lateral area of the knee. (Although Roy has good cartilage in the front of his knee, concerns about his knee were the reason some teams at the top of the Draft in 2007 were leery about taking him.)
"I went to the locker room and I was like, this feels like my meniscus," Roy said. "Unless we made the second round, I don't think I'm going to make it."
An MRI that night confirmed the meniscus tear, and surgery was set for the following Friday. But here is where Roy got a break. Team physician Don Roberts decided to take a different approach to the arthroscopy. Normally, three small holes are drilled into the knee and the surgeon then cleans out the torn cartilage. But Roberts opted to only drill two holes in Roy's knee, and that was important, because the third hole is usually drilled into the patient's quadriceps muscle. Not having to wait on that hole healing was a major plus for Roy.
"Going into the surgery, we had talked about trying to minimize the healing time, so if we got to the second round, Brandon could be available, or maybe for six or seven (of this round), Brandon could have a chance to be available," said Jensen, who was authorized by the Blazers to discuss Roy's condition. (Roberts has a long-standing policy of not talking to the media about his patients). "The hole is used for irrigation so you're able to see clearer. He did away with that hole. That helped with the healing time."
Soon after Roy awoke, he began telling Jensen that his knee didn't feel nearly as bad as he'd thought.
"I was flexing my knee and I said 'it feels pretty good right now,' " Roy said. He could flex the knee well past what the normal range of motion would be just minutes after an operation.
"He was coming out of surgery, so he was saying some goofy things, too," Jensen said. "I figured when he came home he'd probably change his tune ... He was already saying 'Jay, I can bend this thing.' He was on crutches but he pretty much got rid of those by the time he got home. He was going up the stairs on Friday (evening), which was unsuual. He hasn't taken a pain pill during this whole thing. He still hasn't."
Also working in Roy's favor was the nature of the arthroscopy. It was a meniscus shave, not an operation to repair a torn muscle or reset a broken bone. (It also helped that Roy is a quick healer; he played at Washington 11 days after the arthroscopy in college.)
Roberts "said a meniscus tear is not anything that we repair; it's something we clean up and take out," Roy said. "We just have to make sure that we keep the swelling down. Second day, the swelling was gone already ... I was on the court in three days. I went in the gym and said my knee feels pretty good. (Roberts) came in the gym because he didn't believe me. He thought I was just saying it. He came and watched me three days straight. Maybe this is a miracle."
Said Jensen: "He never had any swelling. Never. He started doing his rehab stuff, and by the middle of the week he was jogging on the treadmill. He was running at about 30 percent of his body weight at high speed. We put him through the paces. He never had any swelling, or any pain. Nothing. The only thing was his conditioning. We played 2 on 2 and he struggled. He was gassed. But Brandon said, 'That's not my game, anyway. I don't play 2 on 2 full speed. I pick my spots.'" (Jensen knew this was true; he regularly beat Roy in bike races the two had during the summer.)
Given this new information, and after Roy practiced Friday, the Blazers upped their prognosis. Maybe Roy would be back by late in the Suns' series, and coach Nate McMillan said he might be able to play in Game 5 Monday. But there was the matter of convincing management that it wasn't a gamble to put the team's superstar back out on the court so soon, even though the player and coach and medical staff were all saying, 'Go.' McMillan reached out to Kevin Pritchard, the Blazers' general manager.
"We initially said no way," Pritchard said Sunday.
"But I could tell both of those guys (Roy and McMillan) were spending an amazing amount of energy on this decision," Pritchard said. "I told them, go to sleep. I didn't want them to spend all of their emotional energy on this one decision. I talked to Nate. I could hear it in his voice that he had talked to Brandon and Brandon felt good about it. But I told them to go to sleep and let's all think about it.
"That night I spent a lot of energy thinking about it. What are the hurdles we have to go through? First, the doctors. They said it was the cleanest surgery he'd ever have. Second, was Brandon emotionally ready to play? There was no stopping that kid Saturday. Third is trust. When Brandon has been hurt, he's been honest about it."
Jensen and the medical staff argued that because there wouldn't be a lot of on-court practice time during the playoffs, Roy could use the games as his conditioning tool, to work himself back into game shape. But the decision had to go all the way to the top, to owner Paul Allen. By Saturday morning, the plan was still for Roy to play, maybe, on Monday.
But Roy had other ideas.
"I came in (Saturday) morning. I had worked out pretty good (Friday) night and Coach was telling me he wanted to wait until Game 5," Roy said. "I said all right, that's cool. But I'd been feeling so good, there was no way I could wait until Game 5 ... I said to my fiancee (Tiana Bardwell), 'Coach isn't going to let me play.' She said you have to keep pushing him."
Roy texted Jensen.
"He said, 'Jay, I want to play so bad. You've got to let me play,' " Jensen said. "'There's no reason that you shouldn't let me play. You believe me when I tell you I can't play. I told you with the hamstring (when Roy missed 15 games and the All-Star Game) earlier this year. I'm telling you the truth. You have to believe me now.'"
Jensen, Roberts and the team's other doctors signed off to Allen: Roy was fine. He couldn't hurt his knee any more by playing.
"I wanted Paul to hear for himself that Brandon was ready to play," Jensen said.
While Allen was making up his mind, Roy was in the Blazers' locker room.
"There was nothing further I could do about this," Roy said. "I had to go to the (pregame) meeting and wait. They had to decide if I could play ... I was in my shorts and my t-shirt. I went back to make sure that my uniform was there (in his locker). I was nervous, like I was waiting for my SAT scores."
Pritchard, McMillan and Allen went over the pros and cons one more time. This wasn't just more than $80 million of Allen's money in the balance; it was the team's franchise player, the face of the organization. It was not an easy decision. But Pritchard insists the Blazers didn't think about any short-term gains by playing Roy if he wasn't ready.
"Mr. Allen is probably the best fact-finder in the organization," Pritchard said. "He brought questions that Nate and I couldn't think of, and I think Nate and I thought up questions that maybe all of us didn't think of. We're not afraid to challenge each other. The best thing an organization can have is the ability to agree, to disagree, but to come up together with a decision. And this is a picture-perfect example of that."
Twenty minutes later, with the pregame meeting under way, Pritchard snuck into the locker room through a side door. Allen had signed off. Green light.
"He gave me two thumbs up," Roy said. "He said, 'Go get this win.' Nobody else saw it. We were going through our meeting and Coach was making his speech. I just started putting my uniform on."
With two sutures still in his knee, Roy entered the game with 4:06 left in the first quarter. He knew he couldn't go for 30, but he thought he could be a pressure release, move the ball, make the Suns pay some attention to him.
"We got bombed two days straight," Roy said. "I didn't know how well I could play, but I thought I could give the guys some confidence. They were playing like the world was on their shoulders, especially LaMarcus (Aldridge)."
He made his presence felt in the fourth quarter. The Blazers had a precarious 82-79 lead with five minutes left when Marcus Camby drove the lane and passed to a wide-open Nicolas Batum in the right corner. But Batum turned and whipped a pass to Roy, behind the 3-point line.
"I was like, 'Nic, what are you doing,?' " Roy said. "'You shoot it. I haven't shot it all night.' But he swung it to me and I said, 'Shoot it with confidence.' "
He did, drilling a three to give Portland a six-point lead. Two minutes later, Roy was isolated left of the key against Jason Richardson. Roy took a jab step, stepped back and drilled a 16-footer with 2:10 left to put the Blazers up 91-83. They didn't trail the rest of the way. He wound up 5-of-10 from the floor.
"I felt like I got into a rhythm," Roy said. "J Rich, he started denying me. But I started to feel good."
An hour after the game, Roberts removed the two sutures. There was no swelling postgame. The knee, by all accounts, came through just fine. Roy is now on a 20-25 minute limit, but even Jensen allowed that it will be difficult to take him out of a game if he's going good.
Roy heard that both Kenny Smith and Charles Barkley, on the TNT set, questioned whether he should be out there at all, that someone in the Blazers' organization should have saved Roy from himself, that any player worth his salt is going to suit up in the playoffs. Jensen wasn't thrilled with their opinions. "They were acting like we were knuckleheads or something," Jensen said. "There's a process that we go through to see if a guy can play. We went through that process.". Roy understood, but he wanted everyone to know that this was not a rash decision. He asked me to thank Kenny and Chuck for looking out for him.
"The only thing I'll say I had to fight everybody, from my parents to my friends, to the doctors," Roy said. "But I felt so good. I can cut. I don't think I can get 30 tonight, but I can play. I can contribute. I kept stressing that. I 'm not in any pain ... It's weird, man. I can't explain it. I'm just not trying to question it too much."
What a testament to this kid, whom so many thought didn't have the foot speed to play in the NBA.
His heart is plenty big, though.