Why Did Kobe Go to Germany?

[Renew Deal]

By nearly every metric, Kobe Bryant is having his best season in years. Not only is he leading the league in scoring, but he's also performing above his career average in points per game and rebounds. (As always, Kobe is shooting too much: plus ça change.) Even his minutes are up: Kobe is playing nearly five minutes more per game than last season.

This is not the usual curve of an NBA career. As the economist David Berri has demonstrated, most NBA players exhibit an inverted U curve of productivity, showing a steep ascent as they first learn to play in the NBA. Their peak arrives shortly thereafter, usually around age 24 or 25, and is followed by a steady plateau until age 27. It's at this point that the decline begins: The grind of the season starts to dismantle the body. Joints give out, muscles lose their fast twitch fibers, tendons are torn. It's the usual tragedy of time, only accelerated by the intensity of professional basketball. By the age of 30, their glory days are probably long gone.

And yet, the aging Kobe — he will turn 34 this summer — seems to have resisted this dismal downward arc. In particular, Kobe's arthritic right knee seems to have healed itself, allowing him to return to more aggressive form. As Mike Brown, the Lakers coach, noted in December: "He's done some things in practice that have kind of wowed you as far as taking the ball to the basket strong and finishing with dunks in traffic." Kobe concurs: "I feel a lot stronger and a lot quicker."

Although Kobe has been mostly silent on the topic of his arthritic knee — "I'm not talking about my injury" is a constant refrain — his main treatment consisted of a new therapy called Regenokine. The therapy itself is part of a larger category of treatments known as "biologic medicine," in which the patient's own tissues are extracted, carefully manipulated, and then reintroduced to the body.
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http://www.grantland.com/story/_/id/7796225/kobe-bryant-dr-chris-renna-regenokine-knee-treatment

This article is really interestng, especially the parts about how the procedure isn't permitted in the US.

[laconicsax]

1. It seems that there's been some research into PRP therapy, and the results are inconclusive.

The end of the article somewhat spells out where it all stands:

Of course, it's still far too soon to know if Kobe has found a cure for his broken down knee. (He has yet to find a cure for his ball hogging or for his current shin injury, which can't be treated using biologic medicine.) Perhaps the reduction in pain and inflammation is real. Perhaps we are on the cusp of a revolution in sports medicine, in which superstars find a way to extend their careers. Or maybe the injection of spun blood is just an elaborate placebo, a high-tech gimmick that tricks the brain into disbelieving the laments of the body.

[Boabab]

2. What counts is that the treatment worked for him.

Too bad it hasn't help with a higher shooting %.