Anthony Davis spoke to assembled beat reporters prior to Friday evening’s Lakers game at Atlanta, providing an update on his injured foot.
Below is a full transcription:
Q: An update on how he’s feeling, and how he’s dealing with things mentally.
Davis: Feeling a lot better. Pain has subsided tremendously. That initial, when it first happened, I honestly didn’t feel anything at all for the whole season. And even before the game, warming up, nothing was alarming in my foot. And then that one move, I guess kind of caused whatever it caused. So when I went to get an X-Ray at halftime, it was bothering me, it was very painful. The doctor told me that I had a fracture and a bone spur in my foot. At that moment, and maybe leading into the next day, it was tough for me mentally just because of the fact that coming off last year with the injuries, and coming out and having a mindset of getting back to who I want to be as a player, in that mold, and for something like this to happen was tough mentally. After that, it was just figuring out the next steps to getting back on the floor. The next day, they told me I had a stress reaction in my navicular bone, so I was kinda dealing with two problems. It comes from that piece, the bone spur continuously hitting the navicular bone, causing the stress on it, which is more alarming for me than the bone spur. The stress reaction (can lead to) a stress fracture, and that’s a whole different ballgame.
Q: On next steps.
AD: I think the next step is it’s healing right now. I don’t want to use timetables (and shit) because that’s a whole different thing, but it’s healing pretty quickly. So when we get back to L.A., we’ll do another image of the foot, and see how far it’s healed since the last time I did it which was the 22nd, I think, or the 23rd. And it’s really just about pain. The pain is still there, I still feel it a little bit, not as much as I did before. More like a two (out of 10), trending down to one. I’ve been lifting, and lifting is fine. Everything I do in the weight room is fine. If I see that it’s healed properly, or enough where I can go start ramping up on the court, then we’ll start that process.
Q: On if it happened on the play where he made contact with Nuggets center Nikola Jokic:
AD: Yeah, they’re saying that I hit his leg, but … that was the play, but I didn’t feel anything until I landed. And I started going back down the floor, and I was still able to play through it, but then towards the middle of the second (quarter) is where it started really kicking in, where it started to hurt where I just couldn’t really run, which caused for me to go get the X-Ray, because I knew it was probably something bigger than just a (little thing).
Q: On if there is a fracture:
AD: Fracture in the bone spur, then a stress reaction in the navicular bone.
Q: On what procedure was considered:
AD: Umm, removing the bone spur out. Add more weeks to the … yeah.
Q: On LeBron’s comments about winning:
AD: Umm, I mean he’s right. I’m pretty sure everybody in the league wants to be competitive and compete for championships. It sucks to lose. And especially coming off of last year, and then you come into this year and you start off 2-10 and you make a run, and then we (are trying to) re-track on what we were doing. Yeah, mean it’s tough. I mean he’s not getting any younger. Of course it would only make sense that he would want to compete for championships in the X amount of years he has left in him. So I took nothing from it. I took it for exactly what it was, what he said, and I feel like it’s a true statement.
Q: On finding his rhythm once he returns, after playing at such a high level prior to the injury:
AD: Nah. I'm just really excited to get back on the floor, whenever that date is, to pick up where I left off. That's my mindset. Hasn't been a 'Man, it's going to take me x amount of games to get back in rhythm,' or 'Might not be the same.' That's not even been a thought in my mind. My thought has been, whenever that day is, it's go time.
Q: On if there something maybe there before?
AD: Bone Spur. So they said the bone spur has really been there for years. One doctor even said they'd bet it was probably there when I was at Kentucky. That's how long it's been there. So, it never bothered me my entire career. I never had foot problems or anything. I'm not sure what about that play caused it to happen. I haven't had any problems, not even an 'Ahhh' telling my trainer my foot was a little sore. Nothing.
Q: On all the different conversations with doctors:
AD: One, two, three, four, five I think? Five doctors just taking the imaging and sending it around and just getting information. Especially in the beginning, when they were talking about surgery. Well, I don't like surgery. I feel like, if it can be avoided, then let's avoid it. When that became an option, I wanted to make sure I get the best understanding for me because I'm the one who has to make the decision with that. And it's kinda taken time to think about it. And when the doctors said 'Well, usually when you get an MRI right after the injury, days later, four, five, six, seven days later, it's actually worse because it allows your body to, whatever needs to go, adeema all this stuff, all these medical terms, get a chance to set in. And usually when it's right after, nothing has happened but swelling, which I didn't have. That's why that week, there was nothing. Just waiting to see. Took more imaging, I think, on the 22nd and it actually has gotten better, which was a good sign. Which also kinda pushed me further away from the surgery option. If a week of real hard treatment and things like that and it's healing and trending in the right direction in a week, I can only imagine what it can do if we start adding this treatment and shockwave, bone stim and all these things. It's kinda been what it's like. And now, just watching it and MRI'ing it to death and making sure it's continually doing what it's supposed to do.
Q: On if he will have to take care of the spur later in the offseason?
AD: Probably. Probably. I think the toughest thing is just, kinda twofold. You want to come back as soon as possible to play. But there's also a thing when the spur heals, when the fracture and whatever it is, possibly, it could happen again because it's not taken out. It's there. But then it could be nothing. Definitely something to consider, in the offseason, to remove it. I think the biggest thing is the stress reaction, though, just monitoring that. Because that can definitely lead to six, seven, eight months out -- which I would rather take four weeks than seven months. I'm not saying I'll be back in four weeks -- but hopefully. But we don't know.