Since I’ve posted lots of injury news for various Bulls players this season — Derrick Rose, Joakim Noah, Luol Deng, rookie Taj Gibson, etc. — it seems only fair to give the other rookie his due. To wit: James Johnson started and logged 25 minutes in last night’s game against the Pistons despite a partially torn plantar fascia in his right foot.
Ouch, right?
From the Chicago Tribune: “If I tear it completely, I’m out for a month. But if I rest, I’d be out a month anyway. I’m going to go until the wheel is all the way flat.”
Wow. Talk about taking one for the team.
The Chicago Sun-Times had a minor addition to that quote: ”I’m just gonna grind it out for the rest of the year.”
I don’t know if it was coincidence, but the paragraph immediately following Johnson’s “grind it out” quote mentioned that the Bulls need Johnson’s size at small forward because Luol Deng is out indefinitely with a strained calf muscle. I have a bad feeling that if Deng doesn’t play again this season and the Bulls end up missing the playoffs, we may be in for a whole new wave of “Deng is soft and we need to get rid of him” complaints.
Thanks to By the Horns reader Brad S. for the head’s up.
Update! By the Horns reader and guest poster Tony C. wrote in to say: “At the risk of sounding like a conspiracy theorist…three players on the Bulls have suffered from plantar fasciitis issues, two of which have been fairly serious? I know that it is not an uncommon ailment, but I can’t help wondering whether the highly-paid trainers and physiotherapists in the organization are really doing their jobs well. In any case, it seems like an odd coincidence to me.”
At the risk of sounding like a conspiracy theorist…
three players on the Bulls have suffered from plantar fasciitis issues, two of which have been fairly serious? I know that it is not an uncommon ailment, but I can’t help wondering whether the highly-paid trainers and physiotherapists in the organization are really doing their jobs well.
In any case, it seems like an odd coincidence to me.
Yeah, the same medical staff that won “Physician of the Year” last year when they mis-diagnosed Luol Deng’s injury (and again made him overwork and look weak again this year). I guess Physician of the Year is essentially the same thing as Best New Band at the Grammy’s…as soon as you win it, you immediately start sucking.
Not to jump on the band wagon with the other posters, but I made a similar thread on a sports board a couple weeks ago. I asked the question what the heck is going on with all the injuries, they seem suspect. Noah, Gibson, and Johnsons foot injuries I am not questioning whether they are real but whats going on in the locker room, practice, conditioning behind the scenes that makes Bulls players so vulnerable to this? Why did the Bulls staff baby Drose’s “sprained wrist” (non shooting hand) and made him sit out for almost 2 weeks. At 21 years old you “sprain” your non-shooting wrist, you take an advil and you are back out there in a few days.
Also, what is a “strained calf”? This injury seems dumb. You are 24 years old and you can’t recover quickly from a “strained calf” and you might be out for the rest of the season?
It’s a combination of the staff in some ways possibly not taking preventive measures to injuries and also them babying these injuries has me shaking my head.
Anyways that’s just my 2 cents.
And here I thought Matt wouldn’t want to take on the Bulls doctors again after how their supporters bizarrely flooded his comments section last time 😀
“And here I thought Matt wouldn’t want to take on the Bulls doctors again after how their supporters bizarrely flooded his comments section last time.”
That’s why I let Tony C. do it for me via comment.
Seriously, those Bulls “doctors” scare me.
I hope that the “Physician of the Year” curse takes place. Kinda like “Coach of the Year” curse – where 8 of the last 10 coaches are with a different team now. Sorry Dr. Cole. I would almost blame the trainers for some of this too. Can’t they do some aqua-robics, or conditioning workouts that don’t put so much stress on the big men’s feet? Noah, Gibson, and now Johnson? Who coaches the big fellas… Pete Myers?
It’s time to start ripping faces off!
Guys play some actual sports before you talk a bunch about how to play through injuries. If a player can’t go, he can’t go. There are also injuries that a player can handle, yet are vulnerable to much worse injury in that condition; in other words, its not worth a player playing through something that can get much worse.
Eric,
What NBA team did you play for, and what injury did you have then??