With the NBA, or almost any professional sports league for that matter, nearly all that we see is what happens on the floor.

For an NBA player, who turned pro in their late teens or early twenties, life without basketball has never really existed. All we think about is the millions of dollars they have earned over their career; how hard can it be?

Not the work they have put in day in and day out, and certainly not what they are to do when they are facing everything they’ve ever had be taken away from them..

This is the first episode in an exclusive Grantland series chronicling Steve Nash’s return to the Lakers as the future Hall of Famer fights to save his NBA career and his 40th birthday looms.

“One of the hardest things about this whole thing has been this feeling like, I’m just stuck in no-mans land, in this black hole. It’s like the movie groundhog day,” he said.

“To go through so many days over the last 8 months where I’m not sure. It’s painful to go through the same thing every day and wait and wait and hope the work you’re doing and the rehabilitation you’re doing is going to come through and you’re going to get back out there. But I don’t know if I’m gonna get better.”

Just two years ago he was in the all star game, but last year broke his leg and had nerve issues, and this year the nerve issues have resurfaced.

“Is it the truth, that I am done?”, he asks.

He still longs for his form of two years ago, but admits he is “staring at retirement everyday”.

Nash has called the Staples Center home since signing with the Lakers in 2012.

Whilst the Lakers play their games, Nash’s new home has become the training room where he works out whilst the team plays. He admits it “sucks”.

He’s under contract next year but there is no guarantee he’ll be back.
Watch his touching story below.

Source: Grantland