Popovich delivered a Christmas present to Spurs fans by way of good news. Mills, who has missed the whole season rehabbing from off-season surgery to repair a torn rotator cuff, was cleared by the team's medical staff on December 23rd. There's only one thing stopping him suiting up.
"I'm not going to let him play," Popovich said. "I'm going to hold him off as long as I can. There will be a point where he won't allow me to do that anymore and that's fine. But for now I'm winning the battle. At some point I'll lose it."
Popovich went on to explain that while Mills has been playing one-on-one and two-on-two for a week, and very recently cleared for 5-on-5, that he'll have to prove he can handle game-type contact before he ever steps on to the court for real.
"There's nothing I'm going to see with my eyes, I'm just going to feel better," Popovich said. "I always err on the conservative side and I'll just feel better if he takes more time, gets knocked around on the court a little bit more in our sessions, just a comfort level, because I know if he screws up the shoulder now we're going to lose him for the rest of the year and he's way too important, he affects our offense significantly."
Well finally some good news for us, especially with Parkers status up in the air. Cojo's been great filling in for him but we could really use Patty's scoring right now.