ShareThisMickey Mantle.Gale Sayers.Bobby Orr.Elgin Baylor.I've often wondered how much we missed because arthroscopic surgery wasn't available when they were at the top of their games, only to be felled by knee injuries that robbed them of their wondrous speed and agility.How much better might they have been? How much longer could they have played? How much higher would they rank in the pantheon of the all-time greats in their sports? I ask these questions now, in the wake of Tiger Woods' revelation that he spent the past year playing and winning on the PGA Tour with a torn ACL in his left knee.I ask because Woods, who also played through a double stress fracture in his left tibia to win the 108th U.S. Open last week at Torrey Pines, announced on his Web site that he will undergo season-ending surgery to reconstruct his damaged knee.And because this will be the fourth operation on that knee -- the third in the past five years, the second in the past three months.I ask also because it's not unreasonable to wonder if all these surgeries, all on the same knee, will have a cumulative, long-term effect and take down Woods the way bad knees took down Mantle, Sayers, Orr and Baylor.Probably, though, there's no need to worry.Not these days.Not with all the advances in orthopedic medicine, which have transformed crippling knee injuries into minor nuisances.Don't be surprised if Woods comes back with a rebuilt knee next year and plays his best golf.And contrary to some pundits across the nation, I think Woods made the right call when he decided to play at Torrey Pines.The ACL was already gone and surgery was inevitable. But he had proven he could win with one good leg in other tournaments. Why not try to win another U.S. Open on a course he loves?And so here's what's going to happen while Woods is off the course: Somebody will win the British Open next month. Somebody will win the PGA Championship in August. Somebody will win the FedEx Cup in September.And everybody in golf will try to convince us that these champions are poised to challenge Woods for supremacy in the game.Then Woods will come back in 2009 and all these pretenders will run and hide.Finally, you've got to love the way Rocco Mediate became Rocco Balboa at the U.S. Open, coming out of nowhere and playing better than anyone had a right to expect from a light-hitting, 45-year-old journeyman who wasn't among the top 150 in the world rankings.He stood toe-to-two with the champ and went the distance, losing on the 91st hole. He has every reason to feel good about himself.Eventually, though, it's going to hit him: If he had dropped in a couple of very makeable putts, especially on Sunday and Monday, he'd be a U.S. Open champion.(Ray McNulty is sports columnist for Scripps Treasure Coast (Fla.) Newspapers, The Stuart News, Fort Pierce Tribune and Vero Beach Press Journal. On the Web at www.tcpalm.com.)
Can modern knee surgery save Tiger's career?
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