Welcome to the part of my website created to give fans a behind the scenes look at life as a professional basketball player. This page will be constantly updated to reflect my thoughts on the coach, practice, the team, and of course the game itself.

Healthy Again

First of all, I want to apologize for not updating my blog more often. As you know, I had spent much of the season rehabilitating my knee after having surgery to start the season. My knees were hurting so bad and it kept swelling, and I wanted to do all I could to make it go away. Recently, I returned to the court and began workouts with my teammates again.

One thing I learned from this whole experience is that it absolutely sucks getting older. When I was injured earlier in my career, I just remembered healing a lot faster. Now that I'm a lot older, the human element comes into play and things take a bit longer to recover.

After the surgery, I felt better right away. The team didn't even sign anyone to take my roster spot while I was out. From a psychological standpoint, the mental recovery was the most difficult part. And that took longer for me than the actual physical recovery.

This week was the first week I had a really good practice. It was the first time I really felt like I could run hard, jump and not think about the knee. That felt really, really great. So I'm excited about mixing it up with my teammates and opposing players.

When you go through an injury (especially in the later years in your career), there's no question that you go through a period where you question your mortality as a professional athlete. For me, I was definitely thinking about just how much longer I could do this. There's always that battle within yourself between “I want to do this for as long as I can” and “Will my body allow me to do this for as long as I want to?” Those are two very different things. From a mental perspective and with my love for the game, I still want to be around the game and continue to play. Basketball has been such a significant part of my life, I want for it to continue being part of my life. At the same time, when you have an injury (especially a knee injury), you start thinking about how much harder it is to physically rehabilitate and get your body where you want it to be and play at a high level. When you're younger, you're able to get away with more things because you're body is still nimble. You run and jump and wait for things to happen. But as you get older, it takes more to maintain your body.

With all that said, I still love this game and I still love how it makes me feel when I'm playing. So I will continue to do this for as long as I can. When my body starts telling me that I can't do it anymore, I will listen to my body because I don't want to be around a sport I can't play the way I'd like to play it. That will ultimately determine when it's time for me to leave this game.

It has been a great year for me and I'm looking forward to seeing what 2010 has to offer. Maybe another trip to the NBA Finals? We'll see.

- Adonal