CINCINNATI — Initially, it was a here-we-go-again moment with Pacers reserve center Ian Mahinmi late in the fourth quarter of the Pacers’ fourth preseason game, this time held at Xavier University.
As he was battling underneath the hoop for a defensive rebound, all of a sudden he was down on the ground and in pain. Mahinmi, who finished with nine points and seven rebounds in 19 minutes, clarified postgame that it was his neck — and not his right shoulder.
“It’s not my shoulder this time,” he said with a smirk. “I got hit in the head and then I must have shook my neck the wrong way and it got my whole right arm like numb.”
Mahinmi was down for a couple minutes. He said he didn’t have any feeling down his right arm, like he had just hit his funny bone.
“It was like that on my whole arm,” he said. “I waited and I waited and then they took me in the back.”
Pacers assistant trainer Carl Eaton, who has been overseeing the rehab of Mahinmi’s left shoulder, was the one who accompanied him back to the locker room as just a few minutes remained in this exhibition game against the Cleveland Cavaliers. It was a valiant effort by the Pacers reserves to come back from 17 down, but the Cavaliers squeaked out a 98-93 victory.
False alarm. “It’s nothing serious,” Mahinmi reaffirmed.