Warriors’ Stephen Curry shares honest admission on ‘frustrating’ knee injury recovery

SAN FRANCISCO– After 64 days of reorganizing injury timelines, reconfiguring recovery plans, and passing physical checkpoints, Stephen Curry is finally ready to make his return to the Golden State Warriors.

“It feels great,” Curry said of the patellofemoral pain syndrome and bone bruising in his right knee that’s sidelined him for the past 27 games.

“It’s been a long, long process, longer than I thought. But just happy to have a little clarity and a little window to get back out there and try to get to the level I was playing at and finish the year strong. I’m excited.”

Curry will be listed as questionable for Sunday’s matchup with the Houston Rockets, but the plan is for him to play, according to coach Steve Kerr.

Regardless, Curry’s likely return marks a much-needed injection of life for the Warriors. With Curry sidelined, Golden State has gone 9-18, falling from the eighth seed in the West to 10th, where they will have to win two play-in games to save their season. But for as tough a time as the Warriors have had, Curry’s recovery has been equally as frustrating.

“I thought I was going to be out for like, a week, 10 days max. Let it calm down,” Curry explained. “And every time I got on the court or tried to push it in that first month, there was always, they call it, a reaction, or you knew it just wasn’t healing as fast as you thought.

“So the patience then was tough, just because it’s one of those injuries that you really just have to let rest. There’s nothing you can kind of push through or be on the court while it’s healing, and it’s just a different experience than most injuries that I’ve had.”

How will Stephen  Curry’s knee affect his career moving forward?

Unlike injuries Curry’s had in the past, where the timelines were stable and the checkpoints were concrete, the crux of this knee injury’s recovery was driven by pain tolerance. Some days, Curry would wake up with his knee feeling fine. Other days, inflammation and pain. It’s that specific unpredictability that Curry described as “one step forward, two steps back.”

“There was a moment in Atlanta where I thought I was gonna be a lot further along than it actually ended up being,” Curry explained. “And then you start looking at the schedule, and you start counting games and the milestones that I had to get through to get back to playing, and you start to panic a little bit, just because there was a [deadline for when] I wasn’t going to come back.”

Luckily for Curry and the Warriors, things improved, and the pain and inflammation subsided. And Curry told reporters that there is “nothing structurally wrong” with his right knee after the two-month recovery, as he does not anticipate it affecting him long-term.

However, Curry did mention that this injury is a “new normal” for him in terms of making sure he’s doing all the correct things to keep that knee healthy and strong.

“It’s not like I’m compromised out there. It is a new normal, though,” Curry said. “It’s just a matter of understanding what I need to do off the court to make sure everything around my knee is strong and firing the right way.

“I will take full advantage of the offseason, whatever it is, to have a full reset, and then you just kind of figure out what it looks like going into next year. But right now, I kind of understand what the new normal is, and it’s good enough to play.”

What Stephen Curry brings back to the Warriors

It’s obvious what Curry brings to the Warriors– all-encompassing offensive firepower and unparalleled gravity.

The team’s been buzzing the last two weeks about the Curry-Kristaps Porzingis pick-and-roll they’ve envisioned since they made the trade for him. And Kerr expressed excitement for what Curry’s re-addition will mean for players like Brandin Podziemski and Gui Santos, two young talents who have risen in his absence.

So in the basketball sense, yes, getting Wardell Stephen Curry II back is good. But there’s also a psychological factor the Warriors have missed. There’s a joy and a fun that Curry exudes whenever he steps onto the hardwood that even the brightest superstars don’t have.

“He just brings hope to everybody,” Kerr said. “And so, the sun is shining a little brighter. Food tastes a little better… Steph is the most joyful athlete I’ve ever seen. He loves to play, loves to compete, he loves to work, and that joy is infectious.”

As for Curry himself, finding his way back to what brings him joy was always at the forefront of his mind. While fans and analysts have argued it would be better for the Warriors to shut him down and tank for a lottery pick, it was always important for Curry to return. And for one specific reason.

“I love playing basketball,” Curry said. “Our season has been different than we expected, but the fact that there is something to still play for gives all of us a lot of confidence down the stretch to try to make something out of it. I want to be a part of that.”

Curry will look to give the Warriors a boost in the final stretch of the regular season.

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