One of the things I enjoy most — in addition to writing about and treating injuries — is answering questions about said injuries. So what better way to combine these passions than with a quick mailbag?
Without further ado, let’s do this!
There are many factors that could potentially play a role in tall athletes developing lower-body injuries — some that have been borne out in the literature and others that are more theoretical.
For starters — and this one is more on the theoretical side — players who are taller have naturally longer ligaments and tendons. The theory is that an increase in structure length decreases the structure’s strength, which predisposes it to injury.
Additionally, athletes who are taller also tend to be heavier. As I’ve written previously in regards to former Timberwolves center Nikola Pekovic, an increase in weight drastically increase the amount of force that each joint in the body is exposed to during simple activities like running and jumping. According to this study, the knee joint is submitted to a peak force of 6.9-9.0 times the athlete’s body weight during vertical jumping, landing and jerking activities.
The hip (5.5-8.4 times body weight) and the ankle (8.9-10.0 times body weight) are submitted to similarly large forces.
The net results of being exposed to that strong of forces can take a toll on the body over time. Add in the fact that a previous injury will always increase an athlete’s risk for another injury and it begins to make sense why tall athletes can have difficulty staying healthy at times.
It’s a bit difficult to speculate, but the fact that they haven’t missed really any time is undoubtedly multifactorial. It’s likely a combination of their diet, their genetics, their training regimen, the treatments they received before/after games and practice, their sleep schedules and — perhaps the largest component — luck.
Teams at all levels often integrate injury prevention programs into their training, but often times hundreds of athletes need to undergo and be adherent to the program in order to prevent a single injury. Therefore, injury prevention programs can’t solely explain the Wolves’ relatively good health.
The negative effects of sleep deprivation and travel in NBA players have been well documented for some time now, so it’s likely the Wolves are doing something to address this issue as they perennially travel more than any other team in the league.
Luck, or lack thereof, will always play a role in injury occurrence, but obviously, the Wolves’ medical, coaching, and nutritional staffs are doing something right.
Speaking of luck…
https://twitter.com/AATK_DP/status/961777836804726784
It’s highly unlikely. As I said in the previous answer, luck is a big component with injury development, particularly broken bones. Love (infamously) previously broke a bone in his other doing knuckle push-ups, but that wouldn’t have any relation to his current injury.
NBA and other professional athletes typically have strong bones because they have access to great nutrition as well as participating in activities that inherently build bone — lifting weights, jumping, etc.
Sometimes luck just isn’t on your side.
The tough thing with articular cartilage — the substance at the end of the femur and other bones; it’s made of histologically different cartilage than the meniscus — is that it is avascular in nature, meaning that once it’s damaged it doesn’t grow back.
There are a few different treatments for articular cartilage (or chondral) damage, including microfracture surgery and osteochondral autograph transfer system, or OATS, procedure.
With microfracture surgery, small holes are drilled into the end of the femur, which stimulates bleeding, bringing the nutrients to the cartilage it needs for repair. Unfortunately — and as highlighted by the question — this type of procedure doesn’t always have as good of outcomes as we’d like, though athletes typically return to action between 4-to-18 months depending on the nature of their sport.
The OATS procedure involves grafting undamaged pieces of cartilage from a non-weight-bearing location at the end of the femur or from a donor and transferring them to the damaged location. This procedure is typically done in patient’s who have small articular cartilage lesions.
However, a new development holds potential for a future, more successful procedure for chondral defects. A team of scientists developed a hydrogel compound made of Kevlar that “matches or exceeds” the physical properties of cartilage. Perhaps in the future, rather than undergoing microfracture surgery, athletes (and non-athletes) will have Kevlar grafted into their joints.
All information presented in this article is intended for educational purposes only and should not be taken as medical advice.
