Romeo Langford’s focus on mending hasn’t stopped him from learning.
The Boston Celtics rookie guard gave MassLive.com’s Tom Westerholm a status report about his recovery from thumb surgery and also revealed what has been doing in the first days of his NBA career. Langford underwent a procedure to repair a torn ligament prior to the NBA draft, and his recovery ruled him out of NBA summer league play. He said Wednesday although his thumb is “basically” healed, he still hasn’t played competitively.
“I haven’t done any contact still, but I’m going against coaches and stuff like that,” Langford said. “But I haven’t gone live against defenders.”
Langford’s update is similar to the one Celtics director of player personnel Austin Ainge gave Boston Sports Journal’s Brian Robb earlier this week. The Celtics remain confident Langford will be ready to participate fully when training camp begins next month.
Langford also pulled back the curtain to reveal what he has been working on in the earliest days of his NBA career.
“It’s really just about getting better right now, learning the concepts and schemes and the offense (head coach Brad Stevens) likes to run, and just getting back to 100 percent is the main thing,” he told Westerholm. “… I’m learning concepts and stuff like that, but I’m just really working out, working where the coaches see me, what position I’ll play, and working on different things out of that spot.”
The thumb injury limited Langford during his lone season at Indiana, yet he still demonstrated enough potential to convince the Celtics to select him No. 14 overall in the 2019 NBA Draft. With full use of his hand, Langford is in good position to repay the team’s faith in his ability.
