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Michael Porter Jr. lay on a bed in a patient room, staring up at the
ceiling, left alone with his doubts and fears.

Not again, he thought. Not again.

He felt as if he were in a dream. A terrible, agonizing nightmare. And he
felt intense déjà vu. For good reason: He had indeed been in this exact
room, in this exact bed, inside this exact Dallas medical facility—not once,
but twice before.

MPJ躺在病床上帶著疑慮跟恐懼盯著天花板  「別再一次」他心想 「別再一次」
他感覺像是在做一場夢,一個恐怖、痛苦的惡夢.而他強烈的覺得似曾相識,這是有根據的
:他曾經在同樣的房間,同樣的床,同樣的達拉斯醫療診所—不只一次是兩次

On this afternoon in December 2021, the then 23-year-old had just awakened
from an unthinkable third back surgery in five years. The first surgery
occurred during his freshman year at Missouri in 2017, in which he played
just 53 minutes in three games; the second occurred before the start of his
rookie year with the Denver Nuggets in 2018, causing him to miss the entire
season. He had barely played basketball for two years. Now he was facing a
prolonged absence again. The game he so brilliantly dominated felt like it
had been stolen from him, and all he could do was helplessly wonder why.

“Why?” he asked, lying on that bed a year and a half ago. “Why is this
happening to me again?”



It was an incomprehensible fate to grasp for someone who was once ranked as
the no. 1 recruit in the country. Back then, the 6-foot-10 forward was
praised as the future of basketball, a surefire top pick in the 2018 NBA
draft. Known for his astounding athleticism and wingspan, he could shoot or
dunk over anyone. Leaping was almost like breathing: unconscious, effortless,
easy. Basketball had always come so easy to him.
And now he faced the most difficult part of his young career: wondering if it
was truly over just as it was taking off. It had taken every fiber of his
being just to recover from his previous two surgeries and then miraculously
play well enough with the Nuggets to earn a five-year, $207 million max
extension in 2021.




But after his third surgery later that year, a similar microdiscectomy
procedure to the one he had previously undergone two times, he couldn’t
fathom how hard it would be to attempt yet another comeback. If, that is, it
was even physically possible—especially for someone whose game relied so
heavily on athleticism. He was devastated. “For a lot of guys, that’s
career-ending, one of those surgeries,” Porter Jr. says. “This is after two
of them.

“I thought I had kind of gotten over everything, and now I have to get a
third one? I don’t know if anyone’s ever played—especially at my young age
—after three back surgeries.

“I was just over it,” he says.


「我以為我已經克服了這一切,現在我又要做第三次? 我不知道是否有人經歷三次手術後還

有打球,特別是跟我年紀一樣時」MPJ說「我釋懷了」

The surgeries posed a unique and difficult challenge due to the intricate
nature of the back and the fact that they involved different nerves in his
body. When a nerve gets pinched, compressed, or irritated, it can cause
distress to a number of areas around the body, including the leg, as was the
case for Porter Jr.

It’s a tricky surgery because of how delicate nerves are. If anything in the
surrounding area compresses or irritates a nerve, it can significantly impact
or even completely shut off power to whatever function that nerve serves. In
severe cases, one could lose the ability to use a particular extremity.

Due to the complex nature of his injury, Porter Jr. required extensive rehab
not just for his back, but also for his left leg, including his quad, his
hamstring, and his glute.



由於傷勢的複雜性,MPJ不只需要對背部大量復健,甚至股四頭肌、腿部、臀部

Lisa, his mother, walked into the patient room that December day and prayed
over him alongside Nicodemus Christopher, Porter Jr.’s close friend,
performance coach, and manager. After the surgery, they helped him into a
wheelchair and steered him out of the facility.

In the coming months, Porter Jr. wasn’t allowed to drive. He couldn’t
perform basic movements such as bending down and tying his shoes. If he
dropped a pen, he couldn’t reach down and retrieve it. He couldn’t even sit
up on his own at first. He had to relearn dozens of mundane movements he once
took for granted. “It wasn’t even about getting back to those athletic
moves,” Christopher says. “It was learning to operate in life again.”

他的媽媽Lisa在12月走進病房,跟MPJ的好友兼體能教練兼經紀人Nicodemus Christopher
一起為為MPJ祈禱,手術後他們協助MPJ坐上輪椅離開醫院.

「這甚至不是要恢復那些體能活動」Christopher說「是要學習重回日常生活」

Bridging the distance between where Porter Jr. was and where he yearned to be
—playing at the highest level of basketball, sprinting, cutting, jumping at
full speed—seemed inconceivable.

Emotionally, coping with his third procedure weighed on him. “There was a
lot of sad feelings and there was a lot of really, honestly, depression and
anxiety,” Porter Jr. says, “not knowing if you’re able to fulfill what you
thought for your life.”

縮短MPJ現在的能力與他渴望的—最高水準的籃球全速—衝刺、切入、跳躍的距離似乎是
不太可能的.
精神上他面對著第三次手術的壓力「有很多難過的感覺,真的很多,如沮喪、焦慮」MPJ說
「不知道是否能夠實踐你所想的人生」

When Porter Jr. was lying alone with his thoughts, there was another voice
inside him. It urged him to keep going. To not give in. That driven,
resilient part of him told him that he wasn’t going to quit, no matter how
arduous rehab would be. Day after day, he worked and worked, pushing himself
further.

Now, about a year and a half after that December day, Porter Jr. has emerged
triumphantly as a starter for a Nuggets team playing in the NBA Finals for
the first time in franchise history. The Nuggets will play the Miami Heat in
Game 1 on Thursday.


在12月手術那天過了約一年半,MPJ贏得金塊隊第一次的冠軍戰中的先發位置,金塊隊將在
G1面對熱火

Porter Jr. isn’t his team’s best player, as people might have envisioned
when he came out of high school, but he might be the team’s biggest X factor
in pursuit of a ring. He’s played magnificently throughout the playoffs,
averaging 14.6 points and eight rebounds per game, and he’s flourishing on
the perimeter, shooting 40.8 percent on nearly seven 3-point attempts per
game.

But his impact has been felt far beyond scoring. He’s been a relentless
rebounder, grabbing double-digit boards in seven games. He’s also been an
improved defender and shot blocker, taking pride in his assignments. Instead
of dwelling on aspects of his game he felt he had lost due to his injuries,
such as his athleticism, Porter Jr. focused on what he could gain and how he
could add to his arsenal.



As a result, he’s morphed into a more all-around player, making selfless
plays that contribute to winning basketball. It helps, too, that he is
playing with one of the most dominant centers ever: two-time MVP Nikola
Jokic. “Being able to play with Nikola has been awesome for me,” Porter Jr.
says, adding that Jokic embodies the selflessness that the Nuggets have
embraced. “You have to be kind of like that if you want everyone, the whole
team, to be like that.”

Denver coach Michael Malone praised Porter Jr. after the Game 1 win over the
Lakers for his hustle in diving for a loose ball late in the fourth quarter,
leading to a two-handed Aaron Gordon dunk. “It’s a game-winning type of
play,” Malone said.

“He came up to me during the Phoenix series [in Round 2] and says, ‘Listen,
man, if you want to get Bruce [Brown] in at the end of the game, whatever you
think is gonna help us win the game. I just want to win.’”



He has learned to thrive within his role, sacrificing for the greater good of
his team. It wasn’t always easy. For most of his life, he was a go-to
scorer, but he has learned how to complement the stars around him, including
Jokic, Gordon, and Jamal Murray. “It’s letting go of ego,” Porter Jr.
says, “but that’s our whole team. Our whole team is about that. A lot of
guys are sacrificing.”

Porter Jr. finally feels he’s in the right place. When he’s playing, he
feels he’s back in his element. The pressure to perform well has dissipated
and been replaced with sheer joy to be on the floor at all. To have a chance
to win a ring on the biggest stage of basketball.

“I’m still not fully pain free,” he says. The brace, also known as an
ankle foot orthosis, or AFO, was specifically designed for older people in
recovery from strokes or other nerve damage. Porter Jr. is wearing it while
chasing after some of the best athletes in the world. He believes he is the
first NBA player to wear such a brace.
It isn’t easy to play with, as it severely restricts his natural movement,
making the way he’s able to defend quick forwards even more impressive. But
it helps stabilize him, preventing injury and essentially allowing him to
have more normal flexion and extension of his foot. If he didn’t have it, he
’d literally trip over himself because he wouldn’t be able to pull his foot
up when running.
He used to dread putting on the brace when he first started wearing it. It
wasn’t just because it limited his freedom on the court, but also because it
reminded him of what he had lost. But now, before each game, he thanks God
that such an apparatus exists, because without it: “My career would’ve been
over.”

他起初很怕戴上支架,不只是因為會限制他在場上的行動,也因為這會使他想起他失去的東
西,但現在每場賽前他感激上帝有這樣的儀器存在,因為沒有它「我的生涯就結束了」
He’s felt that sense of gratitude during the Nuggets’ playoff run. During
Game 2 against the Lakers in Denver, Murray hit a 3 to put the Nuggets up
nine late in the fourth quarter. Then, the next time down, Porter Jr. took a
handoff from Jokic, nailing a momentum-shifting 3 of his own to widen the
lead to 12 and forcing the Lakers to call a timeout.

The home crowd roared. Porter Jr. lost himself in the noise, joy coursing
through his bones. He let out a smile.

His parents, Lisa and Michael Porter Sr., and Christopher, who were sitting
in the stands, exchanged glances. They hadn’t seen Porter Jr. smile like
that in a long, long time. Some nights.


心得:大概翻了一半而已,後面開始從第一次背傷聊起,其中大學時遇到全國轉播,熱身時


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※ 作者: Lumia800 2023-06-12 12:49:21
※ 文章代碼(AID): #1aXgFK8J (NBA)
※ 文章網址: https://www.ptt.cc/bbs/NBA/M.1686545364.A.213.html