Nominations ... are ... closed ... for ...

	Sean Elliott announced this summer he'd keep playing, but who knew he'd be this good.

Oh, that's right. They're not tabulating these votes in Florida, so real-time speed is OK.

Where were we?

Nominations are closed for comeback player of the year, even if there is no such official award in the NBA. Most Improved Player, then -- try finding a more remarkable improvement than this. Do we hear Story of the Year in the Association?

It's a little early for that last one, but try beating this in the next nine months: Sean Elliott has a kidney transplant and seven months later returns for the first of 23 regular-season and playoff appearances in 1999-2000. And then he starts doing things that are impressive. He is certain of plans to retire after his Spurs are eliminated in the opening round by the Suns, decides to come back, then comes all the way back, to pre-operation days and even pre-30-year-old.

All those charity appearances on behalf of his cause -- spokesman for the National Kidney Foundation, lighting the torch at the opening ceremonies of the 2000 Transplant Olympics -- and it turns out his loudest, most pronounced statement of inspiration came without speaking. Just by playing.

It's a kidney from older brother Noel, but Sean's guts. He was the Spurs' best perimeter defender almost from the day he returned last season, but now his individual defense, the strength, has him locking up younger, allegedly stronger small forwards, maybe better than ever because the physical improvements come with a veteran's intelligence. He defers to Tim Duncan and Derek Anderson in scoring, but the quickness in beating guys off the dribble shows he's still a legitimate threat.

This would all be noteworthy just because Elliott turns 33 around mid-season and is in the 12th season of a career that was supposed to be short-lived because of bad knees, to where the Clippers passed on him with the second pick in the 1989 draft rather than make such a large investment on someone who probably wouldn't make it to a fifth season. (So how did that Danny Ferry pick work out anyway?) But this makes it near-staggering.

A major-organ transplant, at the retirement age ... and good as new.

He can't be better than ever, because Elliott was an All-Star in 1993 and '96 and averaged at least 17 points a game three times, and the makeup of the current Spurs won't allow that. But he can be better.

	“	I'm not a medical guy, but it just seems to me that if you have that kind of transplant at his age and his stage of career that it should be real tough for you to do this every day. ”
		— Spurs coach Gregg Popovich

"It's unbelievable," David Robinson said. "He looks so fresh. I know he's taking a lot of medication and I know that medication slows you down and brings on fatigue extremely quickly, sometimes you retain a little weight -- there's a lot of things that go along with that medication. But he's doing unbelievable. He looks fresh every night. He's probably got more energy than most of us every night.

"All of us are really impressed. We didn't even know if he was going to come back this year, and now he comes back and he's looking as good as anybody we have on the floor."

"It's incredible to me," coach Gregg Popovich said. "I'm not a medical guy, but it just seems to me that if you have that kind of transplant at his age and his stage of career that it should be real tough for you to do this every day. He's done the two-a-days during the preseason, he's doing everything that everybody else is doing out, and he has as much energy as the rest of them. I don't hold back minutes for him. I just rotate him like I always did before. The only thing I'm going to be is sensitive to back-to-backs."

So Wednesday came, with the Lakers in town for an early Western Conference showdown, a night after San Antonio got routed by 19 in Phoenix. Elliott played 33 minutes -- four more than his early-season average and more than any Spur except Duncan and Anderson in the 91-81 win that made them 4-1. There went that hurdle.

"I've been expecting something since last year," Popovich said. "I was the guy putting up obstacles in front of him all the time last year, and he knocked every one of them down and finally earned his way back on the court and proved me wrong in every single way, as far as not being able to do this. This year, I told him, 'Well, I'm going to play you 15 or 20 minutes [a game].' 'Pop, that's a joke. That won't work.' 'OK, we're going to play you 20 or 25 minutes.' He goes, 'You'll see.' "

We've all seen. Elliott has played well -- shooting 52.9 percent, including hitting eight of 13 three-pointers, those first five games -- while facing up to the responsibility of his new-found role, dutifully and graciously answering countless questions about his fight back when he would prefer to be recognized simply for his job, understanding people are interested in his inspirational story.

That Alonzo Mourning was diagnosed with the same ailment meant the chance to resume a basketball-only life was gone, because he was then transformed into an example of how good things could turn out, but he has likewise handled that with the patience of a four-corner offense.

Part of it is accepting the role: spokesman. And part of it is that even Elliott knows what has gone on is amazing, to come all the way back like this. Proving that he could.

"More to myself," he said. "That was a big motivation. People always try to prove things to themselves, and that's what I was trying to do. I had come back from two knee surgeries and I'd played a year in Detroit, which wasn't pleasant, and that's sugar-coating it. I had already been through some adversity. All that had set me up for something bigger."

Welcome to bigger.

Scott Howard-Cooper covers the NBA for the Sacramento Bee and is a new regular contributor to ESPN.com.