NEW ORLEANS -

on Saturday didn’t want to talk about the latest issue with his left knee, but his body said enough: The

’ franchise player is in pain.

Roy left the New Orleans Arena with a severe limp and more questions about his future after he immediately pulled himself from the third quarter of the Trail Blazers game against New Orleans.

Roy came up lame and wincing after making a pass at the end of a pedestrian dribble drive during his 22nd minute of play. He hopped on his right leg while grimacing in pain and immediately went to the sideline. He hobbled past coach Nate McMillan, telling the coach “It’s my knee,” and went directly to the Blazers’ locker room.

Back in the locker room, Roy was examined by New Orleans team doctor Matt McQueen, who determined his knee was stable but swollen. He asked Roy to perform basic movements, like squatting, but Roy said he couldn’t complete the movements without sharp, piercing pain in the left knee.

The immediate plan is hazy. Both Roy and coach Nate McMillan said he will accompany the team today when it flies to Memphis, where it plays Tuesday, and general manager Rich Cho said the team will take a wait-and-see approach.

“We will see how he feels over the next couple of days and re-evaluate,’’ Cho said via text message late Saturday night.

However, both of the team’s chief medical personnel -- Dr. Don Roberts and team athletic trainer Jay Jensen -- are in Portland. Jensen did not travel with the team on this three-game trip because he is in Portland helping Greg Oden rehabilitate. Assistant athletic trainer Geoff Clark is acting as lead trainer.

Roy said he spoke briefly on the phone with Roberts on Saturday night and said the plan was to evaluate his knee Sunday over the phone after it had a chance to calm down.

“Right now, I’m just going to go with calling it a sore knee,’’ Roy said. “I couldn’t even describe it to the doctors. It was ... discomfort.’’

Roy, 26, has been dealing with a sore and swollen left knee for much of the season, but he said nothing has rivaled the pain he felt with 6:14 left in the third quarter of Saturday’s game.

“It was a sharper pain,’’ Roy said.

The Blazers have drained his left knee twice this season, and this week they sent images of his knee taken in May to a noted Los Angeles surgeon, Dr. Neal ElAttrache.

On Thursday, ElAttrache told Roy that he recommended no surgery, in large part because he no longer has meniscus in either knee. Roy also said that the Blazers team doctors did not feel that microfracture surgery - a major surgery that pokes tiny fractures into the bone to stimulate bleeding and cartilage growth - was needed.

ElAttrache made the diagnosis off of film work taken six months ago, and was not provided more recent pictures of Roy’s knees for three reasons: Roy said he no longer has meniscus in either of his knees, therefore a magnetic resonance imaging would not show any cartilage damage. Also, the Blazers medical staff at the time said Roy had not suffered an acute injury, theorizing that the swelling was from fatigue. Lastly, Roy is claustrophobic, and is uncomfortable with the confining process of an MRI.

Now that it appears an actue injury has taken place, it is unclear whether the Blazers plan an MRI.

“I’m not going to speculate,’’ Roy said. “I’m just going to take it day-by-day and see how it feels. I felt that sharp pain, and it wasn’t going away, so I felt it was best I go out of the game. The biggest thing for me right now is not to think too far ahead.’’

Roy, is in the first year of a five-year, $82 million deal. He has had four knee surgeries in his life - two on each knee - and two since becoming a Blazer in 2006.

He had left knee surgery in August of 2008, after which he had the best season of his career - 22.6 points, 5.1 assists and 4.7 rebounds and the second of his three consecutive All-Star Game appearances.

He also had right knee surgery in April of 2010, returning eight days later to play in the playoffs against Phoenix.

He entered Saturday’s game as the Blazers’ leading scorer, even though he had been struggling for much of the past week because of swelling in the left knee. He thought he had begun to get a handle on the situation this week when he started taking anti-inflammatory medication, which he felt helped him move more freely during Friday’s 24-point performance in Oklahoma City.

One night later in New Orleans, he said he felt fine, even though he went scoreless in the first half. He was 1-for-7 with two assists and one rebounds in 22 minutes when the injury occurred.

“With everything that has been going on the last week or so, in talking about his knee, we are hoping that it’s nothing,’’ McMillan said. “Maybe a bump, or a knee-on-knee, and hope that he can get back. But you have to wonder what is going on in there.’’

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