Richard Jefferson watched a clip of Tracy McGrady being wheeled off on a stretcher Sunday night at the Toyota Center in Houston, and he immediately sympathized.
"I feel his pain," said the Nets' second-leading scorer, whose back spasms-- the same ailment that has sidelined T-Mac and Kenyon Martin in the past few days -- made him a scratch in last night's 96-91 loss to the Spurs. "Everyone knows, especially an athlete, that your back is the core of everything. And you're so finely tuned, that whenever you can't move something, it's excruciating pain."
So Jefferson has been taking anti-inflammatories, muscle relaxers, and he has been getting regular massage therapy to relieve the pain he has felt since Sunday afternoon. As of last night, he was at roughly 50 percent.
The timing is bad, though, which was why he looked so miserable.
"These are the games you live for. These are the games you get excited about, that you kind of mark on your schedule," he said. "So it's frustrating, but for the better of the team we'll take it by ear."