Deron set for ankle surgery Tuesday

Deron Williams’ offseason is going to begin with surgery.

Williams will have procedures done on both ankles by team specialist Dr. Martin O’Malley on Tuesday, the Nets announced Thursday. Williams visited with him earlier this week after having MRIs on his troublesome ankles last Friday -- two days following the Nets’ season-ending defeat to the Heat in Game 5 of their Eastern Conference semifinal series.

“He will have a bone chip removed from his right ankle,” O'Malley said in a statement, “and the left ankle will have an arthroscopic cleanout with removal of spurs from both the front and back of the ankle. Deron is expected to make a full recovery.”

No specific timetable was given for Williams’ recovery, however.
Injuries forced Williams to sit out 18 games this season, with 16 of those coming in two separate stints while nursing a sprained left ankle. Although he saw action in 64 games, his average of 14.3 points, 6.1 assists and 2.6 rebounds were the worst since his rookie season with Utah in 2005-06.

He had platelet-rich plasma treatment on his ankles in January -- the second straight season he's undergone the procedure -- and received cortisone shots in the lateral ligament of each ankle. PRP treatment utilizes platelets from the player's own blood to rebuild a damaged tendon.

Williams also had another round of cortisone shots as recently as prior to Game 7 of the first-round series against the Raptors to dull the pain caused by the awkward spill he took in the Nets' Game 6 win. His rash of injuries admittedly were weighing on him.

"It just took a beating on me," Williams said last week. "I couldn't do what I wanted to. I can't finish the way I want to finish. You start thinking about things. So that was just the main thing was confidence-wise, it's hard to get back to where I was.”

Looks like he’s hoping surgery helps him get there.