Kobe Bryant was not at Lakers training camp Thursday because he was back in Germany getting more platelet-rich plasma therapy on his right knee, reports Adrian Wojnarowski of Yahoo Sports.
The Lakers would only confirm Thursday at practice that he had gone overseas for a mystery medical procedure that had nothing to do with the Achilles tendon injury he is still recovering from, something reported by Mark Medina at the Los Angeles Daily News (among many others). It was pretty obvious from the start what was going on.
The procedure Kobe has done basically takes his own blood than spins out the healing platelet in it, then those platelet are injected back into the knee. This all helps healing in the knee, according to those who believe in the procedure. There aren’t a bunch of double-blind studies on this, but Kobe believes it works so at the very least it works for him.
Kobe is expected to rejoin the team early next week.
Mike D’Antoni says he is not at all concerned about Kobe’s procedure and the impact on his rehab, although what did you expect him to say? D’Antoni is not the one with the power in the Kobe/D’Antoni relationship.
Bryant actually jogged lightly on hardwood Wednesday and stood to take some set shots. You can pretty safely rule him out of the first half of the Lakers preseason (which includes games overseas) and the Lakers have been working on the premise he would miss the entire preseason.
As for the regular season opener, nobody will say Kobe can’t be ready in 27 days, but based on where he is now I wouldn’t bet the rent money on it. Actually, I wouldn’t bet any money on it at all.