Wednesday, June 3, 2009

That explains it....



Lebron James underwent what sounds like a superficial parotidectomy yesterday at the Cleveland Clinic (see, I don't always call it the evil empire). The parotid glands are the largest salivary glands in the body, located anterior to the ears. Most parotid tumors are benign but they tend to grow and can cause unsightly cheek bulges (and rarely can devolve into malignant tumors over time). So surgical intervention is generally recommended.

It's a dicey case, however. I don't do parotidectomies. The gland is bisected by the diaphonous fibers of the branching facial nerve. A superficial parotidectomy involves meticulously dissecting half the gland off all five branches of the nerve. You bag even one branch and the patient ends up with a saggy eyelid or she can't smile properly. I remember as a resident operating on a woman who was literally a professional clown. She and her husband did kid's birthday parties. Nobody likes a frowny, squinty clown, right?

Anyway, rather than lumping our latest collective failure into the Cleveland Sports Jinx, I'm going to go ahead and attribute our ouster at the hands of the Orlando Magic to Lebron's swollen parotid. Better that than give props to the likes of Dwight Howard or the ghastly Hedu Turkoglu.

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

OK, guess that explains LeBron's Choking... But how do you explain your Indians??? Parotidectomies for everyone!!! Didya catch that Ohio State/Florida State game?? Seminoles won 37-6...
It was a Baseball game...

Frank, Braves/SEC Football fan


P.S. When's LeBron gettin that Spine Transplant??

Jeffrey Parks MD FACS said...

Frank-
Did you read newspapers? The dude averaged a 38-8-8 in a losing effort. That's not a choke job. It's not his fault that Ilgauskaus qualifies as disabled in some American states and that Danny Ferry thought it would be a good idea to NOT trade Wally Szerbiak's expiring contract for a viable big man.

And there's nothing that screams spineless like guys who say "I'm an SEC fan!" Pick a team, dude.

Anonymous said...

hahahahaha! good theory, but you should actually attribute the loss to:
Dwight Howard
Hedo Turkoglu
Rashard Lewis
Rafer Alston
Courtney Lee
Mickael Pietrus
J.J. Redick
Anthony Johnson
Marcin Gortat
& Tony Battie

It's called a complete team, you guys might wanna look into getting one as opposed to putting all your faith in King James ;-)

Anonymous said...

Yeah, great INDIVIDUAL, I-N-D-I-V-I-D-U-A-L effort, too bad it's not the National H-O-R-S-E- League...
I've got a team Buckeye, even had a class with Bo Jackson... just wanted to be polite and not rub it in... its that team that beat the Buckeyes 31-14 in the 1990 Hall of Fame Bowl...You guys did manage to pull off a tie sometime in the distant past,,, probably back when Woody Hayes was punchin guys...
Auburn Tigers, go ahead laugh... Ohio State'd be lucky to finish 4th in the SEC,
SEC West that is, in the east they'd be 5th...

Anonymous said...

Sorry if I gave you a little PTSD with that SEC remark... did a little investigatin... turns out the Buckeyes are........

0-8 vs the SEC in Bowl Games

7-10-2 vs the SEC overall, with 3 of those wins comin against Kentucky and Vanderbilt...

No wonder Woody was punchin guys...

But y'all got that "Dottin the I" thing goin on...

Frank

:) I'm just bustin your balls back

Jeffrey Parks MD FACS said...

Frank-
Auburn? National titles since 2000: OSU 1 - Auburn 0. And there's no way Bo Jackson went to class. That was the mid eighties, the era of Barry Switzer and athlete dorms and million dollar booster club budgets. Unless you sat next to him in Badminton 101.

Anonymous said...

Buckeye...
Good on ya for that National Title.. maybe y'all beat an SEC team some day... And I won't even bring up 2004 when my Tigers got the biggest shaft since the Indians sold Manhattan for 23$ of Wampum...Bo went to class, graduated in fact some 10 years later, with whatever degree they give Kindergarten teachers..and it was Fall Quarter 1982, Sociology 101, and you're right, he didn't show up to class much, but then, neither did I... Bo drove a 77' Montecarlo, Curb Feelers and Fuzzy Dice just like you'd expect...
Switzer??? Never heard of him...

Frank