Paul Paul reveals that he received a rare meniscus transplant from a donor

Chicago Bulls guard Lonzo Ball, who has not played in an NBA game since January 2022, spoke on Friday about his comeback from knee issues over the past two years, and said part of the recovery includes undergoing a meniscus transplant from a donor. .

Speaking on the podcast, he said:WAE display“, Paul said his problems go back to the first time he tore his meniscus in 2018 when he was a member of the Los Angeles Lakers. After suffering repeated injuries to his left knee, Paul said he no longer had cartilage left in his knee. He needed A meniscus transplant was performed last year at the same time as a cartilage transplant in the same knee.

“There was no more meniscus, and it was bone on bone rubbing,” Paul said. “The cartilage was gone and the bone was destroyed, so I had to get a new meniscus from a donor. I had to get a bone graft and I had to put in new cartilage as well.”

After spending more than a year seeing specialists trying to properly identify the problem in his knee, Paul underwent a cartilage transplant in March 2023, the third surgery on his left knee in one year. Both Ball and Bowles said at the time they believed the surgery would give Ball, 26, the best chance of getting back on the field again in the future and ruled him out of this final season in June.

“We were trying to figure out what the problem was, so this was a lost year,” Paul said on the podcast.

Although Paul missed the entire 2023-24 season, he has been able to progress in his rehab without feeling the same discomfort he has felt in the past while performing basic exercises like running. Earlier this month, he posted a video to his social media accounts of himself dunking a basketball, estimating in a previous episode of the podcast that his knee was about 70% damaged.

“Good enough to play, but it can still get better I feel,” Paul said. “I still have a long summer ahead of me, but I’m definitely looking forward to the future,” he added.

Ball exercised his player option earlier this month for the final season of a four-year, $80 million contract as part of a sign-and-trade from New Orleans to Chicago in the summer of 2021. He played just 35 games with the team. Bulls since then, but said he’s optimistic he’ll be ready to play at the start of the 2024-25 season.

“I strongly believe in that,” Paul said. “This is the plan I am following and I have not had any setbacks. I expect to play the first match.”

The Bulls had high hopes for Paul’s return, but there are still some obvious hurdles ahead of him before he returns to the team. He did not participate in five-on-five scrimmages or play with any physical contact. The Bulls hope he can do some team activities later in the offseason before reaching his status for next season.

“We will wait and see his development in the next couple of months,” Bulls vice president Arturas Karnisovas said in his end-of-season press conference in April. “He’s progressing well. Everything seems to be free of any setbacks, so we’ll see where he is in a couple of months.”