(The news for weeks is that Derrick Rose, All-Star and 2011 NBA MVP
of the Chicago Bulls, has been playing full throttle after a year-long
recovery from a torn ACL. However, his return for the 2012-2013 season
has all been squashed; he told Turner Sports this week that his “muscle
memory” isn’t getting his body to respond correctly. This all might be a
moot point–the Bulls might be competing in their last game of the year
tonight, a Game 7 against the Nets in Brooklyn.
To say that Chicago is banged up is an understatement. In addition
to Rose, the team won’t have Luol Deng tonight, whose flu infection got
him hospitalized not just once, but twice this past week. Rose fill-in
PG Kirk Hinrich is questionable with a badly bruised calf, while his
fill-in Nate Robinson was reportedly throwing up on the sidelines from
illness during Game 6. Center Joakim Noah is suffering from a case of
plantar fascitiis that has him playing at around 60-70%. His bench
counterpart Taj Gibson is the third Bull to fall to the flu, and barely
made the call for Game 6.
With his team almost paralyzed with injury, many have asked that if
Derrick Rose is going all-out in practice, shouldn’t he be playing in
his team’s most crucial game of the year?
Not having any practical experience in competitive basketball, we
went straight to our man El Mariachi, whose teenage years were wrought
with knee injuries of every kind. Take it away, bru–should Derrick Rose
be playing tonight?)
Every injury a basketball player sustains throughout their career
forever affects and changes the way they play the game. Basketball, like
most other sports, is about millions of different micro-calculations
made by your body every nanosecond. Hand eye coordination, vision,
strength, balance, and awareness all while under physical and sometimes
psychological distress, take their toll on a player’s body and mind from
the jump ball to the final buzzer. Add on top of that an aching heel,
weak knee, sore shoulder, or even illness, the body will adapt like the
amazing creation it is. And whether it’s subconsciously or deliberate,
the body of a player will always over compensate even in the smallest
sense of the word.
In my young basketball career I was diagnosed with osteochondritis
dissecans, a degenerative bone condition that took me out of the game
for two years. Four surgeries, 10 months on crutches and countless hours
of physical therapy later, I was back on the court. But it never was
the same.
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