Grant Hill Puts His Season in Jeopardy with Knee Surgery

Grant Hill received some awful news on Thursday, when a magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) test revealed that the 39-year-old’s right knee suffered a meniscus tear, according to Paul Coro of The Arizona Republic.

The Phoenix Suns small forward is planning to undergo minor surgery Friday morning, and it’s likely that he misses most, if not all, of the remaining 15 games of the season.

Coro is reporting that the earliest Hill could return to the lineup is mid-April, with the season concluding on April 25 for the Suns.

There was no major incident to spark the surgery, but Hill reportedly said that a number of issues piled up and ultimately reached a breaking point. He said the knee first began flaring up two weeks ago after he took a hit to the joint, and then worsened dramatically after he took a charge against the Cleveland Cavaliers.

The prime of Hill’s career was taken from him by numerous injuries, but he has been able to resurrect his career out in Phoenix and has played in 289 out of 297 possible games in his three-plus years with the team.

Unfortunately, this news comes at a terrible time for the Suns, who are currently locked in a battle with the Utah Jazz, Houston Rockets, Denver Nuggets, Minnesota Timberwolves and Portland Trail Blazers for the last two playoff spots in the Western Conference. All of these teams are within three games of each other with less than a month to play.

Hill is the defensive backbone of the team and a key member of the starting five, averaging 10.7 points, 3.6 rebounds and 2.3 assists in over 29 minutes of play per night.

Shannon Brown, who has started when Hill missed games earlier in the year, is likely to start in his absence. Josh Childress, who has been buried on the bench and racking up DNPs, has a chance to return to the rotation as well.