McLeod injury

["j.hironaka" <j.hironaka@unesco.org>]

Roshown McLeod joins Randy Brown on the sidelines. Joe Forte seems to be a 
likely beneficiary in terms of exhibition season playing time. To me, 
that's a kind of blessing in disguise.

Joe

p.s. I hope Kedrick Brown gets more comfortable and in the flow. Some 
people might be tempted to make an analogy to the "clueless" Jerome Moiso, 
but Brown's still a teenager (while Moiso was 23-year-old) and he seems 
like a solid work-ethic kid who can make an impact even when he's out of 
synch. Moiso was never a productive basketball player at any level. As 
athletic as Brown is, he's more than just an athlete. But judging from 
what's been reported so far, it looks like Brown will need to ramp up his 
learning curve if he hopes to contribute by the second half of the Celtics 
season. Eventually, he'll have no problems against defenders like Eric 
Williams and Paul Pierce, but right now it must seem like a quantum leap 
from what he's used to. He needs to keep his confidence level high. Its 
still incredibly early, but I think we should be prepared to view him as 
next year's lottery pick. One could make the same warning about all our too 
young rookies. I just hope all three are blessed with good health. They've 
got great coaches around them in this camp. Give 'em all a year of 
patience. For now, this is Paul and Antoine's team.


http://www.bostonherald.com/sport/basketball/cs10092001.htm
``My leg is dead. I can't feel it,'' he said. ``I have no feeling in my 
foot right now, and I've got a pain in the back of my heel. It's similar to 
what it was like before. It's not as bad as it used to be. It used to be 
unbearable.

``But it's just a little bit scary right now. I'm scared to run on it, 
because when I did it before all it did was get worse.''

When the Celts sent Jerome Moiso to Philadelphia for McLeod and a 
conditional first-round draft pick in early August, they believed the leg 
problems that limited the 6-foot-8 forward to just 35 games last season 
were a thing of the past. Word was the situation had been misdiagnosed in 
Atlanta and that things were figured out after his trade to the 76ers.

``At first, they were treating it as a muscle tear in my calf, and I was 
getting regular therapy, but it got worse and worse and I was trying to 
play through it,'' McLeod said. ``When I got traded, it was diagnosed as 
the peroneal nerve pressed up against the bone. When I had surgery to 
reposition it and put it back into place, it took a lot of the pain away, 
but my leg is still really weak. It just seems like it's doing the same 
thing it did before.''

He is hoping the present situation can be alleviated by strengthening the 
leg, but McLeod has to be concerned of the damage that may have been done 
when he tried to play through the injury.
``I think they did find out what the problem was, but, damn, I was hurting 
for a year, you know what I mean?'' he said. ``I just think it's a matter 
of it being like that for so long.''

The next step is for McLeod to go through what he called ``a nerve test, to 
see if this is the same thing.''

Until he gets those results, he is a frustrated camper.