At least it's not major knee surgery for Jahlil Okafor

THAT NICE BREEZE you felt wafting through the Delaware Valley over the past couple of days wasn't because of anything involving El Nino, or a high pressure system that came up from the south and settled near here.

It was the collective sigh of relief coming from the 76ers organization when the result of the CT scan performed on rookie Jahlil Okafor's right knee revealed that there was only a small tear of the meniscus, and not something more serious. It means Okafor will miss the last 23 games of the season, as he hasn't played since Feb. 28 and will not be able to resume basketball activities for six weeks, following what the team labled a minor surgical procedure.

And since less than five weeks remain in the season, and they say they don't know when the procedure will take place, well, do the math.

Okafor missed two games just after Christmas and then two more a month later because of soreness in the knee. While warming up in Orlando before that Feb. 28 game, he pulled out of a layup line and flexed his right knee several times before some of the Sixers' medical staff came out to talk to him. He returned to warming up and seemed fine in scoring 26 points on 12-for-18 shooting in 28 minutes. But he banged his shin late in that game, missed some games because of it, and felt soreness again in the knee when trying to come back.

It could have been worse. Imagine if there were an ACL tear or something that significant in which he would have had to miss close to a year. What would the mood of the of the city have been then if the team was going into a fourth consecutive season knowing it wasn't going to have one of its key pieces of The Process moving forward after Nerlens Noel missed a season recovering from a torn ACL and Joel Embiid two with his foot problems?

"I didn't know. I had no idea what was going on," Okafor said. "After I missed a few games from my shin injury in the Orlando game, I was on the treadmill and my knee just didn't feel right. I was worried about it, and I alerted the medical staff. That's when they took the procedures to get the scan on my knee and see what was going on. Then I found out about the slight tear in the meniscus.

"I was worried about what was going on with my knee. I didn't know. It was super uncomfortable when I was on the treadmill. It was kind of a sigh of relief because I now know what is going on with my knee and that it was something minor. It was good to know what was finally going on."

Really, in the grand scheme of things, Okafor missing this time at the end of a rookie season that included an inconceivable amount of losing probably will not mean much in what probably will be a long, productive career.

It is a bit of a hit, however, as coach Brett Brown tries to figure out not only what he has in Nerlens Noel and Okafor, but how those two big men will fit in with Joel Embiid next season, if all three are still part of the program.

"I agree that the more that we could see Jahlil and play Jahlil and Jahlil to continue the progress that he has made (would be good)," Brown said. "Sometimes you get caught up, and we have lost a lot of games and it at times dilutes some of his offensive statistics, where he's really had an excellent rookie season. I see it because I look at the defensive rotations and his footwork and his timing and early work. Can you guard a 'four' man? But at times he has to go back to the rim and guard a 'five' man. All those little things defensively that don't show up in statistics, he's improved there, too. For those reasons, I wish that he was continuing to play. But that's not gonna happen, and it's one of those things that we've had experience dealing with. How do you continue to move forward studying, interacting with teams and studying the other players and not let his progression come to a halt? You wish, in a perfect world, that this news wasn't given, but it is.

"In some ways (it's relief) because you get nervous. It's a 10-minute procedure, it's six weeks and we get going again. It is fair. You do sort of take a deep breath and say, 'That's not terrible. That's not bad.' The flip side of it is other people will play more, but we'll miss him, not being able to squeeze a little bit more out of him, let him experience a full NBA season. That's not going to happen, but we'll keep moving on."

It is what Brown has learned best to do during his time here. No Nerlens Noel his first season; move on. Draft Joel Embiid and Dario Saric before his second season, knowing neither will play; move on. Lose Embiid to a second season; move on.

At least this time, with this injury, the moving on will be only for a handful of weeks and most likely nothing more.

cooneyb@phillynews.com

@BobCooney76

Blog: philly.com/Sixersblog