Dwight Howard's road to recovery will be quite slow, says Mackie Shilstone – NBA Update
Dwight Howard had been recovering from back surgery long before he was traded to the Los Angeles Lakers and no exact date of his comeback has been laid down as yet. Howard went through surgery in April to repair a herniated disc
which led him to miss last season’s playoffs and it is expected that he will postpone his debut for the Lakers in the coming campaign.
New Orleans based sports performance manager Mackie Shilstone recently shed light on what kind of rehabilitation Howard is bound to go through.
"The surgeon is the one who sets the criteria, and of course [Dr. Robert] Watkins–doing this for so many years–kind of wrote the book on this stuff," Shilstone said as reported by Bleacher Report, "He's a brilliant surgeon. He's
just not going to bring someone one back who, first of all, is not meeting his criteria and timelines."
Howard did begin the core stabilization process shortly after the surgery but according to Shilstone that was only the first step on the path to recovery. He further went on to contemplate that the key to Howard’s recovery lies
with staying fit and being in the best condition he can be. And considering he will have the best of help from the Lakers training staff, it would not be much of a problem.
However Shilstone did reveal that as long as there is pain in his back, Howard will not be able to return. The pain can be removed by working on a series of aerobic exercises which will help Howard not be fatigued.
“The biggest thing he's got going against him is fatigue...Fatigue will cause Howard and anybody to change their biomechanics, and as he changes biomechanics, so goes pain in the back," Shilstone said.
The good news about Howard’s case is that the back injury has not been deemed chronic which rules out the chances of causing further injuries which allowed general manager Mitch Kupchak to not be hesitant in his pursuit.
Another thing which may have been on Kupchak’s mind is Howard’s history of staying fit throughout his career. He had only missed 7 games in his first six seasons in the NBA prior to the back issues.
However he did not have to encounter such a critical injury in that time. But as he recovers, every Lakers fan would be hoping for a quick recovery and waiting for him to officially adorn the purple and yellow on the court.
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