Rajon Rondo hints at Friday return

By Chris Forsberg | ESPNBoston.com

Boston Celtics point guard Rajon Rondo hinted on Twitter late Monday night that he will return to game action when the Los Angeles Lakers visit TD Garden on Friday.

Rondo's tweet referencing 29,233,380 seconds equates to a little more than 338 days, which would be exactly the duration between his ACL surgery on Feb. 13, 2013 and a potential return on Jan. 17, 2014. Heck, Rondo appears to have even calculated the exact differential in time between his surgery and tipoff on Friday. (The surgery would have been 11:07 a.m., figuring in Friday's 7:30 p.m. start.)

Rondo tore his right ACL against the Atlanta Hawks on Jan. 25 last year and underwent surgery the following month. Both Rondo and the Celtics patiently have navigated the rehab process, even as Rondo admitted to being antsy to get back on the court. Last week he said he'd return before the All-Star break and a Yahoo! report suggested he was targeting a return against the Lakers. Rondo denied that report, but his tweet seems to suggest he might indeed return on Friday.

Before Monday's loss to the Houston Rockets, Celtics coach Brad Stevens said of Rondo's return, "I get the impression, it will be sooner rather than later." Pressed on if it could come this week, Stevens added, "I’d be guessing. I think you could say possibly. It wouldn’t be anything where I would be speaking with certainty."

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Here's the tweet.

29,233,380 secs—
Rajon Rondo (@RajonRondo) January 14, 2014

Rondo is pretty smart.

The way he has handled himself throughout the injury and recovery shows us that he has really grown up in front of our eyes.

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