Bogut looking to regain confidence on the court

Paul Imig Posted: Oct. 2, 2009

St. Francis – After missing 46 games last season with an incomplete stress fracture in his lower back, Andrew Bogut has been working his way towards a full recovery for the Milwaukee Bucks 2009-’10 season.

“Right now I’m about 85 to 90 percent,” Bogut said after the second of Wednesday’s training camp sessions. “Conditioning feels fine, flow of the game feels fine, now it’s just getting that confidence back in my back that I’m strong and I’m fine.

“A lot of it’s more mental than it is physical. I think now it’s just telling myself that I’ve had the summer off, I’ve done all the right things in the weight room, done all the right things with the trainers, worked my butt off in the summer, and hopefully it’ll work itself out.”

Bogut attempted to come back from the injury several times last season, missing four games in the beginning of January before returning for three games, only to be sidelined once again for eight more games. He played back-to-back games at the end of January, but then decided to rest his back for the remainder of the season.

“Looking back, probably if I rested it a bit earlier I might’ve maybe finished the season,” Bogut said. “I tried to play through it as much as I could, and it just kept getting worse and worse. Hindsight, was it smart? No. But that’s just being competitive and trying to get back out on the floor.”

More than five months after the conclusion of last season, Bogut is back on the court for the start of training camp.

“Yesterday I did the contact session for 2 1/2 hours,” Bogut said. “And today I did the morning (session) for 2 1/2 hours and the contact session for one hour.

“There’s some tightness, but no major concerns. I mean, today was starting to get tight with the last session. It’s a lot of training. The trainer said if it starts to tighten up we’ll just pull you out.”

Coach Scott Skiles is leaving it up to the trainers to determine how much Bogut will be able to play throughout training camp and the pre-season as the Bucks center continues his recovery.

“We’ll play him in some exhibition games,” Skiles said. “Obviously we need Andrew. He’s done a great job rehabbing and he looks really good. We’ll just hope he can get out there and not having any setbacks.”

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Bogut looking to regain confidence on the court