Ball would be the first professional athlete ever to resume playing after a cartilage transplant.
Lonzo Ball's long-running injury saga has baffled everyone from fans to NBA experts to professionals in the medical field. After multiple knee surgeries and rehab stints, Ball has opted for a new type of surgery, a cartilage transplant.
Back in February, Sports Medicine doctor Brian Sutterer MD provided a video breakdown of Ball's knee and the procedures he previously underwent. After news broke that Ball would undergo a cartilage transplant, Sutterer put together another in-depth video to explain it.
The biggest takeaway is that Lonzo Ball would be the first professional athlete ever to resume playing after this kind of surgery. This is because cartilage transplants are part of the next generation of orthopedics and sports medicine. The scope of the surgery is to take some of Ball's healthy cartilage and place it where he has damaged cartilage.
Sutterer put forth a very simplistic explanation of the anatomy and physics behind what has happened with Ball's previous surgeries. He then explained in the same detail what the new surgery would achieve.
Sutterer said that few surgeries of this nature have been performed on younger athletes. While the operation has a limited history, some advances have been made, though a lot of the ideas and types of surgeries still need to be revolutionized.
In general, about 76 percent of athletes who underwent the surgery return to sports. These were mostly non-professionals, and it is unknown if they returned to their previous playing capabilities.
Alas, Lonzo Ball's future outlook remains mostly unknown. Getting back to basketball would be a bonus to moving freely without pain. Still, this is not a guaranteed fix.
The Chicago Bulls can hope all they want, but it appears Ball is trailblazing a path that no professional athlete has traveled down before.
More must-reads: