Brooklyn Nets' point guard Kyrie Irving spoke with reporters today for the first time in two months, since injuring his shoulder in mid-November, telling reporters that surgery is not out of the question.
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Irving, who was diagnosed with a shoulder impingement, said that after receiving a cortisone shot on Dec. 24 he was feeling "a lot better," but is still struggling shooting the ball.
“It’s very unique, because it’s the first time I’ve ever had such a significant feeling in my shoulder where I’m going up to shoot jump shots and I can’t really lift my shoulder to get up in that jump shot position and its impinging,” he said.
“There was some bursitis in there that was really, really impacting me going out there and playing my game at a very high level.
"Now I'm just doing the best I can to live off of this cortisone and move forward if I need surgery in the future."
The 27-year-old has not played since Nov. 14 against the Phoenix Suns and has missed 23-straight games since.
"It's definitely frustrating"
— SNY (@SNYtv) January 4, 2020
Kyrie Irving says he's working hard to recover from his shoulder injury pic.twitter.com/e05Svbt1Cq
With the cortisone shot used to delay getting surgery, Irving added that getting the procedure this season is something that could still be on the cards. "It's definitely crossed my mind," he said.
"I am in a better place now that it has been a significant amount of time," Irving added. "The next step in any progression was to either get a cortisone shot or to get surgery. That was the ultimatum I was fixed with. Now, I'm just doing the best I can to live off this cortisone and move forward if I need surgery in the future.
“You either continue to get cortisone shots, which is obviously detrimental to your health in your muscles, or you go get arthroscopic surgery,” he said. “For me, it’s just about being able to go back out there after the right amount of rehab, the right amount of rest, recovery, and see what we can do for the rest of the season and then reevaluate after a few months.”
Irving has only appeared in 11 games this season for the Nets, going 4-7. Since then, the Nets have gone 12-10 and sit in the seventh seed in the Eastern Conference.
