Just two days after filing a $20 million lawsuit against the owners of the New York City nightclub where he was hurt in an ugly June 14 brawl between the entourages of musicians Drake and Chris Brown, San Antonio Spurs point guard Tony Parker revealed that the extent of the left-eye injury he sustained is much, much worse than he originally thought, could be serious enough to keep him from representing France in next month's 2012 London Olympics, and has the Spurs "very worried" about his future.
In his Paris press conference following his injury, Parker said he was at Manhattan nightclub W.i.P. with friends when a bottle-chucking melee broke out, reportedly over the two singers' respective relationships with fellow R&B star Rihanna. Like many other club-goers who suffered injury, Parker said he got caught in the crossfire, with shards of glass from a broken bottle entering his left eye and scratching his cornea. At that time, Parker said doctors had told him he couldn't "do anything for seven days," but that he was "lucky [because the] injury won't prevent me from competing the Olympics in any way."
When news broke Friday that Parker is suing W.i.P.'s owners for $20 million, however, I wondered if that huge price tag suggested Parker didn't walk away as unscathed as he'd previously represented. Now, according to a (possibly not 100 percent accurate) translation of a French interview posted Sunday on Parker's official website, we know that speculation was warranted — the Spurs point guard said subsequent tests revealed that a piece of glass "had penetrated 99 percent of [his] left eye," and that doctors told him he "almost lost his eye." As a result, his status for the upcoming 2012 London Olympics is now in doubt.
Sounds like he's going to miss the Olympics. Hopefully everything goes well with his recovery, without him we're screwed.
