The Giants may have finally given fans a reason why Jason Pierre-Paul struggled in 2012. Now, they just hope it won’t run into next season.

After earlier media reports, the Giants have confirmed Tuesday that Pierre-Paul underwent surgery on his back in Los Angeles. The team put the timetable for recovery at three months, which would mean an early-September return. The Giants open the regular season Sept. 8 against Dallas.

“My back has been bothering me for a while, and even last season I played through some back issues,” Pierre-Paul said in a statement Tuesday. “The treatment I’ve been doing has helped manage the issue, but this procedure is going to get me fully healthy and there should be no more pain.”

He underwent a successful microdiscetomy, which is done to correct a herniated disc.

Pierre-Paul had just 6.5 sacks last season after exploding on the national scene in 2011 with 16.5 sacks. The 24-year-old first-round pick was considered a raw talent entering the league and his breakout 2011 season was seen as a sign of huge things to come.

But there were few answers to his struggles in 2012. He didn’t have a sack in the final seven games of the season.

ESPN’s Adam Schefter reports Pierre-Paul played through the injury last season and received epidural shots to numb the pain.

Pierre-Paul sat out organized team activities last week with what head coach Tom Coughlin said was an excused absence. Coughlin he was “aware of both circumstances there” in respect to the absences of Pierre-Paul and fellow defensive end Justin Tuck. However, he expected them back on Friday, May 31. That session was not open to the media.

The Giants were counting on Pierre-Paul even more this upcoming season after the departure of Osi Umenyiora to Atlanta. Umenyiora was a free agent and one of the reasons the team barely debated bringing him back was due to the emergence of Pierre-Paul.

Mathias Kiwanuka, who played at linebacker last season but was a defensive end entering the league, worked out in Pierre-Paul’s absence last week. He will likely see more time with Pierre-Paul on the shelf. The team also selected defensive end Damontre Moore out of Texas A&M in the third round of the 2013 NFL Draft.

Follow Metro New York Sports Editor Mark Osborne on Twitter @MetroNYSports.

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Major surgery would stress out even the most famous of families, but Brad Pitt says he, his partner Angelina Jolie and their children didn’t let her double mastectomy get them down.

“We set up our own little post-op recovery that became pretty fun,” Pitt told USA Today. “You make an adventure out of it.”

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  PHOTOS: Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt side-by-side through the years

“Adventurous” is not how most of us mere mortals would characterize post-op recovery, but the beautiful, intrepid demigods that are the Jolie-Pitts probably wrestle tigers before breakfast. A little life-saving surgery could be just the sort of thing they consider a fun challenge. Do you think they healed Angelina’s sutures with the sheer power of their beauty?

Pitt is incredibly glad that the procedure went well. “it’s such a wonderful relief to come through this and not have a spectre hanging over our heads. To know that that’s not going to be something that’s going to affect us.”

Angelina Jolie underwent a double mastectomy to reduce her chances of getting breast cancer, and says she hopes her story will inspire other women fighting the life-threatening disease.

Jolie wrote in the New York Times on Tuesday that the operation has made it easier for her to reassure her six children that she would not die young from cancer, like her own mother, Marcheline Bertrand, did at 56.

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Film critic Roger Ebert has died, the Chicago Sun-Times newspaper said in a Twitter posting on Thursday.

Ebert, 70, who had lost his ability to speak and eat after surgeries for thyroid and salivary gland cancer in 2002 and 2003, said earlier this week that his cancer had returned.

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  PHOTOS: Remembering Roger Ebert

“It is with a heavy heart we report that legendary film critic Roger Ebert (@ebertchicago) has passed away,” the newspaper where Ebert worked for decades said on Twitter.

“There is a hole that can’t be filled. One of the greats has left us. Roger Ebert has passed away at the age of 70,” the Chicago Sun-Times added.

Wednesday, Ebert announced he was once again battling cancer again and that he planned to scale back his writing by taking a “leave of presence” from his more than four-decade career.

“I must slow down now, which is why I’m taking what I like to call ‘a leave of presence,’” Ebert said in a blog entry.

He gained national prominence with the late Gene Siskel on the television show “At the Movies with Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert,” coining the phrase “Two Thumbs Up,” until Siskel’s death in 1999. He later teamed with critic Richard Roeper but quit for health reasons.

Forbes dubbed Ebert the most powerful pundit in America in 2007.

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The Knicks announced on Wednesday afternoon, following a new round of X-rays, that Rasheed Wallace will miss at least the next eight weeks following a surgical procedure that he’ll undergo sometime next week.

The injury to the fifth metatarsal of his left foot, also known as a Jones fracture, has kept him out of the lineup since Dec. 15. The veteran forward has only played in 20 games this season and has averaged 7.2 points and 4.2 rebounds per game in 14.6 minutes of action. But it’s what the 6-foot-11 forward offers in ways of intangibles that the Knicks have sorely missed in the last two months.

Wallace is an excellent help-defender, a great communicator on both defense and offense and enough of a 3-point threat (32.4 percent) and shot-blocker (almost a block per game) to keep opponents honest on both ends of the floor.

About the only good news that comes from this new development is that Wallace should be back just as the playoffs commence. Where the Knicks will be seeded, however, is of greater concern, as they’re in a fight to regain the No. 2 seed in the Eastern Conference — a position they held for most of the season, only to lose it to the Pacers within the last week.

The Knicks signed free agent power forward Kenyon Martin last week as insurance should Wallace be unable to return this season.

KNICKS notes

» Carmelo Anthony sat out of Wednesday’s shootaround because of a stomach virus, although head coach Mike Woodson insists that Anthony is probable and will likely play against the Warriors.

» Point guard Pablo Prigioni is a game-time decision, Wednesday, because of some lingering back spasms. The 35-year old rookie has battled through toe and various other injuries so far this season, so it’s likely he’ll suit up and be able to play.

Follow Knicks beat writer Tony Williams on Twitter @TBone8.

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