March 24, 2017
The Sixers announced that Joel Embiid successfully underwent what they're calling "minor arthroscopic surgery" to repair the injured meniscus in his left knee on Friday in Los Angeles.
Dr. Neal S. ElAttrache, who performed the procedure with Sixers Chief Medical Officer Dr. Jonathan Glashow and Sixers Head Physician Dr. Christopher Dodson, said in a statement that the focus was to remove "a small portion of the meniscus" and that Embiid should be able to return to full weight-bearing activities "in approximately two weeks."
Dr. David T. Martin, the Sixers director of performance research and development who stayed behind in California with Embiid after the Sixers' last road trip to seek additional opinions on that meniscus, said that the team believes Embiid will be back on the court sometime this summer. *If* that turns out to be the case, it seems like a reasonably positive outcome for the Sixers.
"Based on the program that has been outlined, we will continually evaluate Joel's progress against predetermined benchmarks and anticipate he will resume basketball activities this summer," Martin said in that same statement.
The Sixers again emphasized that they will use a conservative approach with Embiid (as opposed to all-too-common, "We're gonna be reckless"), who will begin the first portion of his rehab in Los Angeles.
"We are very pleased with his post-surgical assessment and forecast for a healthy return to basketball activity," Sixers president of basketball operations Bryan Colangelo said.
After surgery, Embiid checked in with some positive thoughts on Instagram:
JoJo's latest on Instagram pic.twitter.com/57zHphZF0C
— Rich Hofmann (@rich_hofmann) March 25, 2017
Follow Rich on Twitter: @rich_hofmann
