Brand Hurt Foot Before First Game

After using crutches to climb aboard the team bus this morning in Tokyo, Clipper co-captain Elton Brand revealed that he had not suffered a broken right foot during Thursday’s loss to the Seattle SuperSonics.

He was injured, he said, before racking up 21 points, 15 rebounds, eight blocked shots and five assists in the season-opening defeat.

“It didn’t happen in the game,” he said a few hours before the Clippers lost to the SuperSonics, 124-105, in a rematch at Saitama, Japan. “It happened, I think, in practice. I knew coming into the game. I tried to get treatment, tried to wear some padding to try to combat the pain....

“I was playing on adrenaline, just trying to win the game. I knew I was in pain, but you’ve got to play through pain sometimes....

“I didn’t think it was as severe as it was.”

He had a better idea afterward, when he said he could barely walk out of the Saitama Super Arena. After returning to Tokyo with his teammates, Brand was taken to a local hospital, where tests revealed a hairline fracture.

He was on crutches Friday, was scheduled to be fitted for a walking boot Monday in Los Angeles and is expected to be out four to six weeks.

“It’s very disheartening,” said the 6-foot-8, 265-pound power forward, the Clippers’ leading scorer and rebounder the last two seasons and owner of a new six-year, $82-million contract, richest in club history. “Coach [Mike] Dunleavy’s done a great job getting us prepared and I thought it was going to be a pretty good season.”

Actually, it was expected to be a rebuilding season, with Brand a cornerstone. With the 2002 All-Star expected to be out of the lineup perhaps until mid-December, the project takes on a new degree of difficulty.

“It’s possible that you could have that feeling of, ‘poor me,’ ” Dunleavy said. “But I would rather take the other approach; that it’s an opportunity for somebody to come in, play well and emerge. If we can stay close until we get him back, then we’ve developed our team and we’re better.

“Obviously, it’s not something you would choose to have happen, but it’s here. You’ve just got to make the best of it.”

In his first three NBA seasons, Brand missed 11 games because of injuries, but he sat out training camp last year after knee surgery and was sidelined for 20 games because of leg injuries last season.

Now, he’s on the shelf again. “It’s just bad luck,” he said.

But, he added, “We work real hard; you put a lot of stress on your muscles and bones and I was trying to be prepared to lead the team this season.”

He was unable to pinpoint when or how he broke his foot. He said it happened after the Clippers arrived in Japan on Monday, perhaps at practice Wednesday, the day he and Corey Maggette were named co-captains.

“It was hurting, but not to the [point] that I thought it was broken,” he said. “I knew it was painful, but I didn’t know it was that bad.”

It would have pained him more, he indicated, to sit out the opening game.

“I’m a pro athlete, and if I’m healthy, or semi-healthy, I feel like I should play,” said Brand, whose work ethic has been applauded by Dunleavy.

“And that’s exactly what happened. I knew I was hurting, but I just had to play.”