With offseason shoulder surgery behind him, Sean Durzi is right on track in his return to action
# With offseason shoulder surgery behind him, Sean Durzi is right on track in his return to action
# Contributors
# Players
# Staff
# Summary
For the first time yesterday, the LA Kings were whole once again. As Viktor Arvidsson rejoined the main group at Toyota Sports Performance Center, the Kings finally had all expected members of the season-opening roster on the ice at once. Arvidsson was the last piece of the puzzle, joining the most recent add before him in defenseman Sean Durzi.
# Notes and Quotes
# Sean Durzi
When I made the decision to kind of get it done and have to get it fixed, I knew the biggest thing I wanted to work on was kind of my speed and explosiveness. Talking to the people around me – the coaching staff, the trainers here – when it’s an upper body injury, you obviously have to take some time off but when I got back to it, I was able to do a lot of the explosive work. Maybe not kind of jack up my shoulders, but we have so many machines and there’s so much technology that I was able to kind of work on those kind of things.
There was one back in juniors, kind of a nagging thing and I really didn’t know I needed surgery until like three weeks before the season, so I ended up missing a couple of weeks. Similar idea where I had to monitor my training with it, that one was probably a little bit worse because I didn’t know what it was at first, it was nagging. This one I got ahead of it right after the season, got it done and in the summer I had a good plan, a good team in place and just had to execute it.
I’ve separated shoulders, but this is the first time I’ve come back from shoulder surgery, which is a little bit different,. Any upper-body injury, where you know you’re going feel it in contact, there’s always that hesitation but practicing at one-hundred percent and practicing with full contact with these guys up there, it gives me a little more confidence every single day. So [yesterday] was a really good day with contact in battle drills and things like that.
Not quite, I don’t think I’m ready. It’s nice to be out of the red jersey and to kind of get into some contact today but it’s a process, taking bodies and things like that, but I’m progressing well and it shouldn’t keep me out long.
It’s tough to know, but all I can say right now is I’m progressing well. The biggest thing is taking it day by day, I’ve been so patient with it, I’ve done a good job this summer and the people around me have done such a good job that I want to make sure I’m getting ready to go.
Already, it feels better than it did last season, so that’s awesome. I’ve noticed it a lot in my shot, the way I can handle the puck, my movements out there. When I first got the surgery, then you progress and progress and then I got to that point where I was last season] and now it’s like I’m surpassing it and it’s really cool to see that. It makes it all worth it, makes patience worth it and to go out there hopefully feeling better than it was, it’s exciting.