Golden State Warriors: 3 expectations for DeMarcus Cousins’ return

2. Rust to shake off for Boogie

In the number of videos posted of Cousins’ rehab process, he’s looked fairly spry for a guy his size coming off such a brutal injury. It seems as though he’s done everything necessary and then some to make it back to the court.

Alas, as any NBA player can attest, a guy can take all the right steps to recover from injury, and may even look like his former self in a number of practices, but nothing he does can ever simulate a real NBA game, which is where Boogie is likely to struggle early on.

It’s been nearly a year since Cousins first suffered the Achilles tear. That means he hasn’t played an actual NBA game in nearly a year. He hasn’t experienced the familiar physical beating in nearly a year. His body may be at 100 percent, but no player can miss that much time and jump right back into things as if he never left.

Cousins’ game is as much about skill as it is brute strength. While it’s fairly easy to just power through opponents with a 270-pound frame, it’s little aspects like timing and footwork that come with constant in-game reps, and it’s those things Boogie will need to fine-tune after so much time spent away from the game. Getting back to his former self could, unfortunately, take a good amount of time.