Blog a Bull

your friendly BullsBlogger - January 24, 2012 reply

I had a damaged ligament on my thumb, was told close to tearing

I got a brace to wear for a month and really couldn’t do a lot with the hand. Swelling was bad for the first week, as was the pain. But then it only hurt when actually doing anything. I tried to play some basketball and the pain wasn’t bad while playing, but it hurt bad afterwards. Doc mentioned surgery but like they said above, was told it should heal on its own with rest and time.

Yibs - January 25, 2012 reply

It's like he started a sentence

and then just forgot about it.

cayal - January 24, 2012 reply

No editor.

Tim S. - January 25, 2012 reply

Worry Not

What’s with this laid back schedule the NBA laid down? Surely we could have crammed all 82 games into it, right? Every team will be depleted by the time the playoffs come, so I do not see the big deal everyone is making. At least the Bulls’ players can play through them… thus far. I assume they will have to allow crutches and walking boots in the playoffs, which bodes well for all teams.

Judas Pato - January 24, 2012 reply

All the sissy talk is nonsense, but I think it's fair to say that Luol is injury prone

I mean, isn’t this his third injury where he was seriously hurt on a seemingly harmless play? But whatever, hard to get down on a guy for bad luck.

And if Deng’s plan fails and a (then) season-ending surgery is required, it would effectively sink their shot at the Finals.

Unfortunately I agree, and this is also why the front office should look to consolidate some of this talent we have into another superstar (not that they haven’t already, who knows). This is an argument that’s been had here before, but when your team is so reliant on the contributions of many players in order to win big, it’s difficult to sustain success. Whereas if it’s say, just Rose and Howard, for the most part you just have to worry about keeping those two healthy to compete in the playoffs

Juiceboxjerry - January 24, 2012 reply

exactly, i wish they would do the surgery and at worse hell be out two months

idk bout deng being injury prone b/c he def doesnt have the injury history like elton brand or a young player like stephen curry is def injury prone. Alot of his injuries have been bad luck and keep in mind this is his wrist we are talking about. Its a very easy place to injure esp in contact sports like bball. I have sustained a sprained wrist; however, not as bad like deng. It healed, but it took a good 2-3 weeks.

Geo4MVP - January 24, 2012 reply

where do you get 2 months?

KC says 3-4, Sam said 3 and he’s a doctor.

I don't get the doctor thing

He doesn’t act that way at all. You just hate Sam and want to rip on him.

BoxingHideout - January 25, 2012 via iPhone app reply

wait wait wait

you mean yfbb is unneccesarily vindictive? get outta here.

paddyfairview - January 25, 2012 reply

I'm pretty sure EVERYONE named Sam is a doctor

you’re just in denial!!!

Prevenge - January 25, 2012 reply

what the hell?

i thought u might have joined recently. but since 2008 and ur just finding this out?

Yibs - January 25, 2012 reply

doesn't that increase the risk?

Wouldn’t it be harder to keep 2 guys healthy if they’re so critical to our success?

SidM - January 25, 2012 reply

No

If we have five guys (let’s say Rip, Rose, Boozer, Noah, Deng), and we NEED each one to be healthy to win a title, that is much more difficult than keeping two guys healthy, just based on odds. In this scenario, Boozer, Deng, Noah and Rip each have just as much team value to the Bulls as Howard, only the odds of an injury happening are multiplied by 4. That’s without factoring in injury histories and all that.

That being said, it would truly have to be a superstar of Dwight’s caliber to make that kind of trade off

I'm not even sure if that's true the way this season has unfolded

I’m starting to believe Thibs when he says this team has more than enough talent to win

Yeah, but things are a lot different in the playoffs. His defense and rebounding will be huge

No doubt we can continue to play well during the regular season without him for a while

I don't disagree with your logic, just this initial assumption

If we have five guys (let’s say Rip, Rose, Boozer, Noah, Deng), and we NEED each one to be healthy to win a title

Seems to me that if your talent is spread out, then you’re better equipped to make up for the loss of one player with the 2nd unit. I mean, Rip’s barely played and we’ve still been steamrolling through the league so far. Especially so far the drop off from Boozer/Noah hasn’t been huge to Taj/Asik. And hell, even though Rose is a superstar, CJ and Lucas have held their own to the point that our record hasn’t suffered.
Now if we swap 2 of those 5 for Melo, Howard, whoever. Suppose then either Rose or that new superstar gets hurt. Then we’re f’ed. With less depth, those 2 would have to play heavy minutes, and with those minutes would come an increased risk of injury.
Of course this is countered by the idea that with more depth, heavy minutes isn’t necessary…which hasn’t really been the case for Deng. Who knows, maybe if Thibs had Howard or Melo they’d only play 30 min a game.

SidM - January 25, 2012 reply

I was kinda looking at it in a bubble

If we’re really gonna dig in to that hypothetical situation, it gets kinda dicey seeing as there’s no way of knowing what players Howard and Rose would be surrounded by. So you can’t say the Bulls would be more equipped because of Taj, CJ whomever, cause that assumes that Howard and Rose would be playing with a team of Scalabrines. This isn’t “the Bulls” vs. “Howard and Rose”, this is “Deng, Boozer, Noah, Hamilton, Rose” vs “Howard and Rose”, and which team is less likely to suffer a crippling injury.

I guess I would say the Howard Rose team is more likely to be crippled by injury

because an injury to either is crippling. The former team is only really crippled if Rose goes down.

But yeah, this is a dead end discussion. Really it boils down to our respective opinions of how vital the non-rose bulls players are.

SidM - January 25, 2012 reply

I would say that relying on two players to carry your team

is more risky than relying on five. Let’s look at it from an expected value standpoint. If we assume that on a two star team the two stars each contribute 50% of the team’s total points and each have a 20% chance of getting injured it would follow that the expected value for each game would be 80 points, assuming the the team scores 100 points per game. (2 *(.5 * .8 * 100)) = 80. Using the same assumptions, a five player team would also score 80 points per game. (5 *(.2 * .8 * 100)) = 80.

However, we can probably assume that the risk of injury on a two man team would be higher on the two star team than it is on the five player team. With Thibs already playing his stars an inordinate amount of minutes, we are probably looking at 40+ minute games for Howard and Rose. More minutes means more fatigue. More fatigue means their is a greater chance that the player is relying on a muscle or ligament that he wouldn’t otherwise be relying on if he weren’t so damned tired. All of this leads to a higher probability of more injuries.

Thus the .8 figure in the first calculation should probably be reduced giving the five player team a higher expected value. Yes, it is sexy to say that you have two superstars on your team but from a win probability, it is probably more prudent to rely on the five man team.

i feel like if we dont win the title

we need to look at moving jo and lu while they are worth something before they officially get tagged as injury prone by the rest of the league

sin - January 25, 2012 reply

I'll agree with this

I don’t even think it has to be both. If you could swing one or the other for an upgrade in talent, that would be great. I feel like Jo or Deng with Mirotic and the Charlotte pick would be nice for any rebuilding team. But you wait out this season. Several contracts are up this year anyway and restructuring to a certain extent might be necessary.

DRoseO1 - January 25, 2012 reply

Ya with the Bulls' window closing so fast something needs to be done now.

Rose will be 24 and maybe looking to retire by then. Deng and Jo will have proved their uselessness if the Bulls don’t win this year. We might as well blow this team up if we don’t win it all.

Sarcasm

One of the great things us Humans have.

It's a reply to Sin of all people.

I didn’t feel that his comment warranted an 11 page treatise. Feel free to elaborate on the usage of sarcasm though if it bothers you so much.

It didn't bother me

I like I agree with you. lol

I like sarcasm, and I agree with your sarcasm there

are you being sarcastic now?

Who knows?

Dun dun duuunnnn!

My bad

I thought you might have been one of Sin’s devotees.

obnoxious american - January 25, 2012 reply

I don't think sin has devotees.

Poloplaya14 - January 25, 2012 reply

HA

those…don’t exist.

Ha haha hahaha

BWHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!…what poloplaya said

I wish we could have moved you before you trolled the ish outta our site here

I think I want to trade sin for souleater

Or just lend him to cleveland.

Heres to hoping that while miserable due to constant pain that Deng helps lead us to where we tryna go. The question is how much of his game will be affected by playing hurt. Hopefully not to much. The bulls are on a mission and the troops know what they have to give to succeed. Not too many times do players have a chance at a ring. Seems Deng is gonna attempt to do his part. Let the pansies have surgury when we could be on the cusp of greatness. I cant see MJ, kobe, larry bird, or magic sitting out this situation when theres something to contribute. Heres hoping the best for Deng.

Rose2RipKaboom! - January 25, 2012 via Android app reply

in before somebody suggests Brandon Roy

also, in before we trade for John Salmons

kpd - January 25, 2012 reply

Deng should get this taken care of now

I wish Luol Deng would just have his wrist surgery now rather than wait a few weeks, come back, cause further damage, and then have surgery which at that point would be season ending. To hell with the first seed. I think the Bulls have a better chance at beating Miami with Deng and no home court advantage than they do with home court advantage and no Deng. When it comes to a LeBron James team, home court is nothing in the mind of the refs. I want Deng to get his wrist take care of now so he at least has a chance to come back for the playoffs. We absolutely cannot beat the Miami Heat in a seven game series without Luol Deng.

kpd - January 25, 2012 reply

As much as losing Deng for the playoffs would suck, I don't think we'll be completely sunk

It just makes the margin of error really small. Everyone else is gonna have to bring their A game (especially boozer and Noah), but we have the depth to survive. But of course, here’s hoping it doesn’t come to that.

Poloplaya14 - January 25, 2012 reply

3 to 4 months?

If that’s the case, he’ll probably be ready for the playoffs. Maybe not till the second round or so but based on how well he played at the beginning of the season with essentially no training camp, I wouldn’t be worried about his performance once returning. Now I really want him to have the damn surgery

Coming into an NBA season after a summer break

where, presumably, he was still doing a lot of working out, and keeping himself in shape, then working his way into things with all the other players, is a lot different than rehabbing a serious injury for months and being thrust into high level games against elite competition. We saw it with Noah last year.

Personally, I’ll just take his word for it. If he thinks he can play through it, and still be close to what he was, I don’t see anything wrong with it. But if he starts sucking, and/or missing big patches of games due to pain, then it will be obvious that he made the wrong choice (and unfortunately it’ll be too late). We’ll just have to wait and see what happens

He could still stay in basketball shape

And luckily (not really that lucky) it’s on his non shooting hand.

I’d like to believe he’d come back strong. Maybe not what we’re used to seeing but much better of than he’ll be with the injury

Locust_Inferno_666 - January 25, 2012 reply

why no mention of jimmy????

just kidding. but for reals this no surgery idea just sounds dumb and like hes rushing back when you combine it with his supposed hinting at trying to play on sunday.

just dumb. get surgery. get healthy. playoffs are all that matters. dont mean shit what we do in the regular season.

id rather be the 8th seed and have a healthy team

sin - January 25, 2012 reply

and hey just to be positive

mavs lost caron and everyone counted them out but they still pulled a title out of their asses. maybe we can too!

go jimmy!!

sin - January 25, 2012 reply

Paul Verhoeven and MS Paint have already given me the answer to this whole situation guys.

ROBODENG!!!!

Alex Sonty - January 25, 2012 reply

K.C Johnson @KCJHoop: Thibs "optimistic" Deng will play Sunday after having his head/spine inserted into cybernetic body: "He feels pretty good."

Locust_Inferno_666 - January 25, 2012 reply

When Lu does come back...I will cringe every time he tries to take a charge.

BTW do we know what play he injured the wrist on? I don’t remember seeing it.

Ya know, I was just thinking a bit

and I DEFINITELY don’t want him to get surgery. If he get’s surgery, and isn’t ready for the playoffs, we’re totally fucked. Meanwhile, if he opts to play through the pain, we have time to see what kind of player we’ll be getting. If he looks like a shadow of his former self, that gives the org recourse to find another option. Sure, it won’t be as good as a healthy Luol Deng, but let’s say they can somehow pry Grant Hill from Phoenix, that would be a pretty decent fallback, wouldn’t it? For a team that’s built to win RIGHT NOW, I think this is the right way to do things

This is basically my line of thought.

He would be rusty as hell after surgery…and I don’t think there is a guarantee he would be back for the playoffs anyways.

What I really want to know at this point is what amount of time off right now will help him deal better with the pain long term? I just don’t want him to rush back immediately if taking more time will help him deal with the injury to a greater degree.

Its a wrist injury...

On his non-shooting hand. He says he can play through the pain, so he will play through the pain.

This is not the type of injury that should affect his defense or his shooting…I am not really worried as I expect all players to play through injuries at some point in their careers.

Dionysus2.0 - January 25, 2012 reply

Right

Plus, maybe he won’t try to take the ball on the fast break!

obnoxious american - January 25, 2012 reply

god willing.

if it is 3-4 months

and he will play thru pain
and assuming he will do the same with the olympics
Deng will have surgery by the end of August
So he would return next season by November/December

eh

if he needs surgery, he’ll have it in time to be back by the start of next regular season, great britain be damned. when you make that kind of money, you need to get your priorities straight – if he delayed his surgery because of the olympics and missed actual NBA games because of it there would rightfully be an uproar from fans and his teammates and coaches.

John T. Unger - January 25, 2012 reply

I think it would be totally understandable

he’s The Player for UK in the London Olympics. I wouldn’t mind if he loses a few reg season games. Specially to be a healthy and defend the championship we will win this year ;)

i suppose if we win the championship this year

and he wants to do a victory lap in the olympics, i could probably find it in my heart to forgive him if he misses a few games. short of that, i see no circumstance in which this would be acceptable.

John T. Unger - January 25, 2012 reply

meh

regular season games

The Finals extend all the way through the end of June this year.

I wouldn’t shed a tear if both Derrick and Deng didn’t play in the Olympics this summer personally. Rather have them rest up. Knowing them though, they will play, which is their right.

That is, of course, if the Bulls reach the Finals.

Which with the Rose and Deng injuries seems a little less likely this week. We will see how they both hold up.

agreed

IIQuickSilverII - January 25, 2012 reply

Saw this coming, unfortunately.

Deng’s Luhawk is like Samson from the Bible; the hair makes him invincible.

Brigade17 - January 25, 2012 reply

Dammit

#Denghawk4MVP

Prevenge - January 25, 2012 reply

Why not just rest it 2 months and then go at it?

No surgery, but resting it for a month or 2….

The 3-4 months is too much.. if its a 8-90 day deal then id say do the surgery and try to have 5-10 games before playoffs to be ready…. this coming back during the playoffs isnt going to work…unless he is to come off the bench, it would not work out if he were to come back as starter ready to defend Pierce, lebron, Carmelo

I like brewer, but we are otehrwise really thin at the 3… korver?, bewer is great but more of patchwork, and sort of undersized since he is a 2 guard…Taj, well he can defend many at SF but not the solution either…his shooting sucks too anyways….and Butler is so far in the rotation i dont think we can hope all of the sudden he will play int eh rotation and be an asset.

haha… damm yah..salmons would be nice but let get real…. anything realistic out ther on freeagents… or a trade-4-darftpick ??

From a occupational therapist's point of view....

I may have a little insight on the thought process and prognosis/diagnosis of Luols torn wrist ligament. Just based on the way he fell and the reports of his pain in his thumb, I am guessing he has a torn scapholunate ligament.
The wrist has 8 small bones so it is a pretty complex joint. The scaphoid bone and lunate bone are both located near the thumb or radial aspect of the wrist. It is actually the most common wrist/ligament injury in sports.
With this injury there are varying diagnosis based on the tear ranging from partial tear to complete tear. My opinion is that luol has a more severe partial tear. This means that the ligament was likely torn (or sprained) but not a complete tear. With a partial tear that athlete or person is able to try non-surgical options to start. He would need 2-6 weeks of minimizing activity and doing treatment/therapy. Then he could start wearing a brace/splint on wrist and re-start activities. If this option fails and does not heal on its own, then surgery is warranted.
If Luol had a complete tear in which the scaphoid and lunate bones are “gapped” or seperated then surgery would be recommended initially.
So based on the information we heard, and the choices Luol has made. I am feeling that he may just have a more advanced partial tear that he/doctors are hoping will heal by itself in the upcoming weeks/months.
This is likely why he has opted against immediate surgery and instead chosen to play with the wrist after this initial healing period.
Obviously I am not a doctor, but as an occupational therapist I do work with splints/braces and exercises for patients with wrist injuries. Most patients opt for non-surgical options anyways due to the risk factors with ROM (range of motion) following surgery.
Anyways, this is my best guess about his diagnosis and I thought I’d pass it all along to you.

K_yle33 - January 25, 2012 reply

Wow. Great insight...thanks for sharing.

If he needs 2-6 weeks…I hope the Bulls keep winning at a good clip and he gets the 6 weeks to let it heal as much as it possibly can. I fear some losses will put pressure on Lu to come back too quickly.