This is one of the best injury comebacks I’ve ever seen from an NHL player. The Detroit Red Wings and Patrick Kane are making NHL medical history as Kane has been one of the best players in the NHL since his return to the full-time lineup from his hip-resurfacing surgery.
There’s NO WAY Kane DOES NOT WIN the Bill Masterton this season for what he’s doing.
Despite having one of (if not the) most serious and career-threatening surgeries an NHL player can face, Patrick Kane has come back and shown no sides of surgery side effects or rust as he’s been one of the best players in the NHL over these last few months. And, if you couldn’t tell, I think his success is such a fantastic milestone for the medical professionals, Kane, and the Red Wings.
What Patrick Kane is doing right now should not be possible.
So, for those who don’t know the severity behind the surgery Kane underwent this past offseason and the early part of this season, Patrick Kane had a hip resurfacing surgery done on his hip (obviously) due to the wear and tear his body sustained over his long career. Now, that may not seem so terrible in the name, but the procedure is really quite grewsome.
Essentially, Kane had the upper end of his thighbone dislocated in his bad hip, it was trimmed down, capped with a brand-new metal cap, and then all of the dying, calcifying cartilage was removed before his hip was popped back into place. That’s sounds pretty knarly, right?
Well, it most certainly is as there has only ever been four players before Kane who had the procedure done. Ed Jovanoski, a Florida Panthers defenseman, was able to come back for 37 games the season after his surgery before retiring abruptly due to not being able to play on the hip. Ryan Kessler, a once-great Canucks center, had the surgery done during the final year of his time with the Anaheim Ducks…but was never able to play on it.
Carl Haglin, a Stanely Cup-winning winger for the Penguins, also had the surgery done on him, but he was forced to retire from an eye injury before testing out his hip. And then Niklas Backstrom, one of the greatest Washington Capitals players ever, had the same surgery this past offseason too…and was only able to play in 8 games for the Caps before heading back onto long-term injury reserve.
In other words, this surgery pretty much kills off your career. And if you don’t get it, you most certainly won’t have a career as your hip just isn’t able to function properly anymore.
So, how is Kane doing?
He has currently played in 27 of the 35 available Red Wings games since his return (77% of them), he’s scored 12 goals, set up 16 assists, racked up 28 points in 27 games, and he’s helped lead the Red Wings to a 32-20-6 record (70 points). Oh, and that’s good enough for Detroit to make the playoffs as the 7th seed if the season ended today. And that would be the first time in 7 seasons the Red Wings made the postseason.
Yeah, Kane is playing at an INSANELY HIGH level right now and is more than proving his “freakish” talents as his hip doctor, Dr. Edwin Su, said during his recovery stage. Now, I don’t know if the Red Wings will be able to make the playoffs this season regardless of Kane’s amazing play, but if Kane can stay healthy and at least half as productive as he is now, then this is a massive success story.
It’ll show that players CAN undergo serious and risky surgeries like this, and reasonably expect to come back and play at a high level again.
And if that isn’t a sports medical breakthrough, then I don’t know what is.
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