Imagine someone stabbing your groin, hip and abdominal area all at the same time. Now, imagine you’ve gotten surgery, returned to work as a professional basketball player, then aggravated your wound on your first day back on the job.
Welcome to life as Miles McBride, whose sports hernia sustained in late January required a core-muscle surgical procedure, rendering him sidelined for two months of action. And when McBride returned to the court for a March 29 matchup against the Oklahoma City Thunder and dove for a loose ball, only to come up grimacing and leave the game for good, he didn’t need more than a day to recover in time for the Knicks’ March 31 matchup against the Houston Rockets.
McBride chalked the pain, the incident, the scary exit to being part of a process he hopes can help put the surgical procedure in the past.
“It’s a tweak, and it’s a painful tweak. It’s not necessarily as bad, it’s just sometimes you can’t do anything about it,” he said. Asked to explain the injury to those who’d never experienced it, McBride let out a sigh and laughed: “It’s like someone stabbing your groin, hip and ab at the same time. It’s not fun, but I’ll get back right.”
The surgery, he said, successfully tightened the core area he hurt on March 27 against the Sacramento Kings. Diving for 50-50 balls, making hustle plays, or even defending with physicality and force can jar things loose once again.
McBride said he and the medical team were prepared for an aggravation.
“It’s really just a part of the recovery process,” he said. “Basically everything was tightened, and now I’m back to moving around, so it’s just part of it.”
McBride was in the middle of a breakout season with averages of 12.9 points on 42.2 percent shooting from deep prior to the surgery. In four games since returning, he has totaled 15 points on 5-of-22 shooting from the field and 5-of-17 shooting from 3-point range (though he shot four-of-nine combined over his last two games).
Much like the physical toll the surgery took on his body, McBride and his team expected a slow ramp back into playing form.
“It’s a tough thing to be out so long, have a surgery in the middle of the season,” he said. “So just leaning on God, my teammates and my work ethic and I’ll be good. I’ll do whatever I can do to help this team.”
McBride is in the second year of a three-year, $13 million deal and will be eligible for a contract extension this summer.
DIAWARA’S ROLE
Knicks rookie Mohamed Diawara is taking his new role on the bench in stride.
Diawara, selected 51st overall in last year’s NBA Draft, became a Mike Brown rotation mainstay early into the season, particularly due to his 3-point shooting and defensive versatility as a 6-foot-9 forward. He has since, however, fallen out of the rotation altogether, a situational call as the Knicks prepare to make a playoff push.
“I mean, the team is here for me. I know it’s a tough position for me to be in the position that I’m playing in — to play and then to not play — but the team is here for me: my teammates, the coaches, everybody’s been giving me advice,” Diawara told the Daily News. “So it’s been cool and I just like it, even if it’s a tough position, I know it’s a position I’m supposed to be playing right now.”
As a rookie, Diawara has averaged 3.6 points on 39% shooting from deep over 67 games. He said he is unsure if he has played well this season.
“I think I’m learning. I think I’m learning each game. I can’t say if I’m playing good or not,” he told The News. “I don’t feel that I was playing really bad. I think because the coaching staff was trusting me and giving me some playing time, I thought I was doing a good job, and I hope I’m still doing it. I just try to play my game and be ready for it.”
Diawara says he doesn’t check social media often. If he doesn’t, the rookie will see a number of Knicks fans clamoring for Brown to throw his young forward back onto the floor. Diawara might not be in the rotation now, but he’ll stay prepared for when his number is called.
“Oh yeah? I’m not really on [social media],” he said. “But I know I really love the Knicks fan base for all the love.”