Knicks Morning News (2024.04.04)

That’s awful but not unexpected, nor is anyone to blame. I did lots of research on torn labrums because my kid had a mild tear and we had to weigh the options. As I have been saying all along, dislocations of the shoulder almost always involve a torn labrum, and often damage to surrounding tendons/ligaments in rotator cuff. If the latter only involves grade 1 or 2 partial tears, that can be rehabbed. But the labrum is essentially cartilage connected to bone and a tear will not heal on its own. Since it is the cup in which the ball of the humerus sits, if it has “minor” damage, you can rehab the surrounding structures to minimize (but not eliminate) the chance of re-injury. So my guess is that it was in the gray area, probably more towards the surgical end of the gray area. Julius was told that there was maybe a 10-20% chance that he could get by with rehab, and that even if he had surgery immediately he’d be out for the season anyway, so he didn’t have much to lose by trying. He tried and at this point he hit a wall, and if he came back, he’d be at too much risk of a second dislocation, which would possibly lead to permanent damage that could not be addressed by surgery.

There are two silver linings here. First, that his initial injury was not severe enough to result in immediate surgery suggests that it’s a pretty straightforward repair with minimal chance of recurrence, and second, I believe I read somewhere that a strongly rehabbed shoulder joint both lessens the recovery time and improves the long-term prognosis. I don’t think he should be at any statistically significant greater risk of injury post-op than he was before.

Now if he were a pitcher, quarterback, or volleyball hitter, or even if it were his left shoulder, there would be a likelihood that his arm strength would never come back to 100%. Since it’s his off arm and he’s not playing one of those high-velocity sports, he should be pretty close to 100% by opening day 2024-2025, maybe even by training camp.

In my daughter’s case, she opted to play through it because she only had 2 very short college volleyball seasons left and surgery might have effectively ended her career as a hitter. She didn’t have a dislocation and was not at risk of one, but she was continually in pain while playing and for the day or two afterwards. Now that she’s done, it still bothers her when she does CrossFit overhead stuff, but not enough to consider surgery. BTW for anyone here who does XFit, she made the quarterfinals of this year’s CrossFit games!

Well, another year will go by when we can’t really evaluate E’s theories on playoff Randle, and by extension, playoff Thibs. I would suspect that E will react with something like, “Hey, losing Randle is actually a gift, and it frees up Thibs to coach without catering to his prehistoric choke-artist game, so if we don’t actually improve in the playoffs, that’s even more evidence that Thibs can’t coach in the playoffs.”

Truly not trying to troll, E, I’m interested to learn if that’s how you feel…

BE, beyond “good days/bad days, there was the specter of a rusty, hurting Julius coming back, trying to do way too much, tainting the vibe, and sabotaging possible wins. We would definitely be better off with an happy, healthy, effective Julius. But with 7 games to go, that ship had sailed.

From Woj:

“Randle, who has been out since dislocating his shoulder on Jan. 27, had been relentlessly rehabilitating to resume playing prior to the Eastern Conference playoffs. Doctors warned him recently that continued instability in the shoulder made it unsafe for him to play again this season, sources told ESPN.

He had done everything possible to avoid surgery and return for the playoffs. However, the procedure became an increasing inevitability after recent visits to two specialists who warned of further injury and possible permanent damage to the shoulder if he returned to play before a surgical procedure, sources said.”