Before the 2016-17 season, Milwaukee Bucks shooting guard Khris Middleton was on the verge of another breakout season. During the previous season, Middleton averaged a career-high 18.2 points per game and was trending upwards as a top shooting guard.
However, during a Bucks open gym a few weeks before training camp, Middleton’s leg slipped on the hardwood and he went down with an apparent hamstring injury. Middleton later found out that he’d torn his hamstring right off the bone and he’d miss extensive time.
Following from Jake Fischer of Sports Illustrated.
“I did a split,” Middleton told The Crossover. “I was crushed.”
Middleton is respectively one of Milwaukee’s biggest young pieces and his injury was heartbreaking before the season started. But Middleton didn’t choose to dwell on his injury and instead went through the rehab process with a positive outlook.
Marvel’s first black, title-character superhero fueled Middleton’s comeback. “Luke Cage is a beast, man. You can’t take that guy down no matter what,” Middleton said. The mantra seeped into each rep and every set. The Bucks’ training facility doubled as his comic book. “I told myself I was invincible. Nothing can stop me,” Middleton said. He bounded over hurdles, leapt laterally against the force of resistance belts and regained his balance on a state-of-the-art trampoline Milwaukee installed before the previous season.
Middleton went through a lot of adversity with this injury, but he overcame it and to the liking of his teammates looked like his old self again.
“He just got stronger,” Vaughn said. “He looked like the old Khris, same great moves, same great pace.” He received a thumbs up from Milwaukee’s training staff on Feb. 8, returning to action ahead of schedule, five months after the crossroads of his professional career.
