LOS ANGELES -- It was a more devastating injury than Derrick Rose's torn ACL, bigger than Chris Bosh's strained abdomen, and no one ever talks about it. It's tucked into a box among the most obscure NBA mementos, like the fact the 1971 NBA Finals were played in a 1-1-1-1-1-1-1 format.

The injury was too significant to be forgotten so easily. It was an injury that involved a reigning champion and a future MVP. It deprived a team of a legitimate chance to win back-to-back titles and probably gave birth to a mini-dynasty.

On April 11, 2000, Tim Duncan tore the lateral meniscus in his left knee in the 78th game of the season. He missed the final four games of the regular season and forced Spurs coach Gregg Popovich into a monumental decision: go with Duncan in the playoffs, or keep him on the sidelines.

Duncan didn't make it easier.

"I was doing everything I could to get ready to play," Duncan said.

He ran sprints up and down the court to show he could still move. But there was a loose bit of cartilage flapping around in his knee. The joint could have locked up at any moment.

Tim Duncan has stayed on a winning track with Tony Parker in a Game 3 comeback. Soobum Im/US Presswire

Popovich was just too worried about his asset.

"He was young, a franchise player," Popovich said. "He wasn't just a No. 1 pick. With him, you've got an opportunity to win multiple championships, if you don't screw it up. I didn't know if [the injury] could get worse, or get chronic."

Popovich liked his team, and he liked its chances. He just liked Duncan even more. He told Duncan to shut it down.

"I don't know if it was right or wrong," Popovich said. "But we did it."

Without Duncan, the Spurs took only a single game from the Phoenix Suns in the first round and were quickly dispatched. Suddenly, this wasn't just about the Spurs; it was about the Los Angeles Lakers as well.

In the second round, the undersized Suns didn't stand a chance against the Lakers, who took them out in five games. You can't overlook the fact that a still-developing Lakers team that was figuring out how to win on the fly did not have to face the Spurs, the defending champions, who had swept L.A. out of the playoffs the year before. Somehow this tidbit didn't even make Bill Simmons' extensive "Footnote Title" list, in which he broke down the forgotten backstories for seemingly every championship team in the past 40 years.

The Lakers had just struggled to beat the eighth-seeded Sacramento Kings in the first round, getting pushed to an elimination game before Shaquille O'Neal even had a chance to receive his Most Valuable Player award. They later would be taken to seven games by the Portland Trail Blazers in the Western Conference finals. They could have been had.

Instead, they went on to win the championship. The fragile bond between O'Neal and Kobe Bryant was strengthened just enough by that triumph to enable them to stick together long enough to win two more and get to the Finals a fourth time.

By the time the Spurs did get another chance at the Lakers in the playoffs, the Lakers were surging with confidence, in the midst of their three-peat, and they swept right past San Antonio in 2001.