Nick Piccone
It’s not a terrible thing that Jahlil Okafor will miss the rest of the season, apparently, if only because the reason he’s missing the rest of the season is due to a small meniscus tear in his knee and nothing more.
Okafor missed four games leading up to the realization that his season would be ending, and has been dealing with knee issues pretty much all season. They haven’t been serious issues, but it’s a little disconcerting that he says he’s dealt with pain in the knee for a while.
According to pretty much everyone everywhere, that’s not a problem, though. They might as well be saying, “Knee surgery, schmee schmurgery.”
The 76ers power forward will undergo arthroscopic surgery to repair a torn meniscus in his right knee, the team announced Friday. The Sixers will finalize the date of the procedure in the coming days. Okafor will not resume basketball activities for the next six weeks, meaning he’ll miss the remaining 17 games.
“You do sort of take a deep breath and say that’s not terrible, that’s not bad,” coach Brett Brown said of the meniscus injury. “The flip side of it is, other people will play more.
“We’ll miss not having him to squeeze a little bit more out of him, let him experience a full NBA season. That’s not going to happen.”
…
“At times it was uncomfortable, but it was nothing too bad where I felt I couldn’t play,” [Okafor] said. “Different parts of the season, my knee was uncomfortable.”
Okafor wore a customized brace on his right knee in the locker room Friday. It was the same one that he wore Thursday at the team’s practice facility.
“For me, I was worried about what was going on with my knee,” Okafor said. “I didn’t know. [This is] just kind of a sigh of relief, because I was able to know exactly what was going on with my knee and that it was something minor. It was good to finally know what was going on.”
Let’s hope it’s not a more serious issue that will cause Okafor to miss the entire season next year. Because, you know, the Sixers.