Playa Vista, Clippers October 27 - Griffin and Dunleavy talk about the Injury

This is a curse…although, I’m not one to believe in one, but then again, better safe than sorry. This is just a FREAKY accident, but in any case, this cycle of injuries need to stop….

The national media has synonymously linked Clippers with “curse” or “underachievement” or “loser”. I love my Clips and it kills me to have that association but who can blame them?

I think in order the “break” this curse, I propose the following:

- CHANGE THE NAME!!! No more “CLIPPERS”; call it something cooler so as to not associate Clippers with losing. Look at the Tampa Bay “Rays”!

- MOVE LOCATIONS! We can’t live under the shadows of the Lakers anymore. We need to have our own identity. Move to Anaheim or San Diego, or heck…City of Industry next to the new stadium they’re going to build

- CHANGE THE JERSEYS! This is part of having a new identity.

And no, changing coaches or owners or personnel isn’t gonna do it. We’ve been through this merry-go-round before and the only constant has been the Clipper name. I think we ought to change it if we’re serious about having our own identity and remove the negative label…and heck, “break the curse”!

Griffin should be on crutches, and now “walking around without even a brace on his knee.” Even though it’s a minor fracture, it has NO CHANCE of healing unless he keeps weight off it while he does bone stim; especially at his weight. It probably doesn’t hurt a whole lot, but he can’t fool around with it if he wants to return to full running and jumping form, and once again, I can’t believe Jasen Powell is letting him do this.

In Griffin’s favor is that he’s young and bones can heal more quickly; against him is his weight (not that he’s fat, just that he places a lot of weight on that knee). The two variables are his (and MDSr’s) patience, and what kind of psychological impediment this causes when he gets back to full power; I hope none.

Punching the driver of a car her was currently riding in.

This confirms what I was thinking and hoping. I’m no doctor, and most of us only have a layman’s view of these things. But we’ve heard about stress fractures before, and they’re not really the same as when something is “broken.” Unless I’m wrong, it shows up as a small line on an xray or MRI (though I’m not sure what MRIs look like—some one else can talk about that). I don’t know if a stress fracture is the same as what used to be called a “hairline fracture,” or what a hairline fracture was—a line the size of a hair?. But I think SP is right: the key is non-displaced. It seems to be a weakness, a small line or fracture running through the patella. The patella is completely intact: that’s the non-displaced part.

It seems to be far from a major injury. It’s step two, with added precautions, after the bone “bruise” with Craig Smith. If anybody wants to ask questions, that’s a good one: are they sure that there was no fracture he knocked knees with Smith? It sounds like Griffin has a full range of motion. We don’t know the degree of the swelling. They were fairly patient and waited for the swelling to go down after the initial “bruise.”

Another point is that the writeup said that this is a very uncommon injury. It doesn’t seem to me as if this has anything to do with Griffin having “bad knees.”

It also seems excessive for ESPN to have led with the headline that “Griffin breaks kneecap.” That sounds a lot worse than what has happened here. Griffin has to let the patella set and stay away from running and jumping and banging, but he’s going to feel like he’s fine and “healed” in a week or less. It’s going to be hard for him to hang around while the team is playing. But he should be fine.

I think this is wise.

Better to sit him for six weeks than to jeopardize him long term.

Plus, as Zhiv says, it unburies DJ and Smith.

No more injuries, though. Please.