“Arthroscopic surgery” does not describe a procedure, but rather the device that enables it: the arthroscope, whose name derives from the Greek arthron (meaning joint), and skopein (to look at). An arthroscope, then, looks at joints.
In medical terms, this is not a new instrument. A primitive kind of scope was found at Pompeii, the Roman city destroyed by a volcano in AD 79. The first remotely modern arthroscope dates to the early 1800s, when a German doctor illuminated two tubes with a candle to examine the inside of the bladder. The instrument slowly grew in sophistication, though it still seems a case of the examination being worse than the illness. (One French doctor ignited a mixture of turpentine and gas to create light that would bounce off mirrors to provide a view of the bladder.)1
In 1912 a Danish physician used a scope to examine the inside of the knee joint; he also coined the term “arthroscopy,” which stuck. Arthroscopy advanced steadily from there, and after World War II a Japanese doctor, Masaki Watanabe, continued the work. He designed scope after scope, adapting electronics and optics to create the finest arthroscopes in the world. His masterpiece, completed in 1958 and known as Watanabe number 21, is considered the first modern arthroscope.2 The twenty-first-century version, shown here, does not look much different from Watanabe’s finest.
So what does all this have to do with sports? For centuries, the arthroscope had satisfied curiosity and helped in diagnosis. But with Watanabe’s version, it also became a means of treatment. He performed the first arthroscopic knee surgery on a 17-year-old who had twisted his knee playing hoops. The young man went home that day and was back on the court weeks later. American surgeons began cautiously using the procedure in the early 1970s; by the end of that decade, it was routine.3
For his work, Watanabe is routinely referred to as the “father of modern arthroscopy.”4 But he could be also be called the “father of second chances,” because that is what arthroscopic surgery, the most common orthopedic procedure in the country,5 has offered to thousands of athletes.
Its great advantage is a small one. Rather than carving up a whole joint to see the problem, in arthroscopic surgery, the doctor makes a small incision—as short as a quarter of an inch—into which the scope can be inserted to look and operate through. That means less trauma to the body and a swifter recovery.
In late 1981 downhill skier Steve Mahre underwent arthroscopic surgery on both knees; five weeks later, he became the first American man to win a World Cup race.6 Gymnast Mary Lou Retton (see the 1984 entry) was back in the gym the day after her operation.7 In both cases the surgery was relatively minor. Not so Adrian Peterson’s. The Minnesota Vikings running back ripped up his anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) in December 2011. After arthroscopic surgery, he was back on the field, at full speed and strength, at the beginning of the next season.
Arthroscopy can be done on any joint, including hips, wrists, and ankles.8 But along with the knee, the most famous kind has to do with the elbow—better known as Tommy John surgery. In a fairer world, it would be known as Frank Jobe surgery, for the doctor who invented it. In this procedure—officially “ulnar collateral ligament reconstruction”—an elbow ligament is replaced by a tendon from another part of the body. Tommy John was the first pitcher to try it; he pitched for another 14 years.
Like any medical procedure, there is risk involved, but arthroscopy has proved its mettle. As of 2015, more than 500 major league pitchers had undergone Tommy John surgery;9 about 80 percent made it back to the majors,10 and two-thirds pitched to the same standard as before.11
For sports fans, arthroscopic procedures have brought longer careers for great athletes, but also a sense of wistfulness. Red Grange, Billie Jean King, Sandy Koufax, Mickey Mantle, Joe Namath, Bobby Orr, Gale Sayers, Smoky Joe Wood, and many others—what more could they have achieved if arthroscopy had been available for them?