ESPN Tennis

He's almost there.

After more than two years out of the game with a back injury that required three surgeries and left him bedridden or glued to the sofa, Taylor Dent is a week away from returning to the pro circuit -- something his famous father likened to a miracle.

Dent, a relentless net rusher with a serve that rivals Andy Roddick's, is slated to compete at back-to-back Challengers in Carson and Yuba City, both in California, starting May 26, the weeks most tennis fans will be watching the French Open. He got in via wild cards, so he won't need to use his protected ranking of 56th.

Dent last competed at an invitational tournament in South Carolina at the end of April on his 27th birthday, but retired in the second round because of his back. It turned out to be a precaution.

"I can't believe he's running around with a back full of titanium doing the things he's doing," said dad Phil, his former coach and a loser to Jimmy Connors in the 1974 Australian Open final. "He's doing what he can with what he's got. If he could get to the level he was before, and better, it'd be down to his incredible effort plus medical science."

Dent always struggled with his back, routinely receiving injections when the pain became unbearable. He pulled out of a second-round match in Rotterdam, the Netherlands, in February 2006 and soon after was diagnosed with a broken bone in his back. A first operation performed that May, in which a hot electric needle was used to probe nerves and remove ones causing discomfort, proved unsuccessful.

Another procedure the following March failed to alleviate the problem, and he went under the knife again in September 2007. This time, screws and small bars were used to secure the broken bone, and a bone-growth compound was inserted.

By now Dent knows a thing or two about rehab, and, finding it hard to watch tennis because of the uncertainty surrounding a comeback, he switched off the TV for a while.

"Physically it's been tough, but mentally it's been a lot tougher," said Dent, whose career-high ranking of No. 21 was achieved in August 2005. "There was a time when I saw a tennis match on TV, I would start to get down in the dumps and say, 'Forget that, it's just a waste of time.'"

Support from his wife, former women's pro Jennifer Hopkins -- who's currently studying fashion design -- and father and mom, 1977 U.S. Open doubles finalist Betty Ann Stuart, got him through. (Talk about pedigree. Dent's stepbrother and godfather played pro tennis, and cousin Misty May-Treanor won gold in beach volleyball at the 2004 Athens Olympics.)

Nowadays it's not a question of whether the back hurts. Rather, it's a case of whether it's manageable. Since the event in South Carolina, which featured two other Americans who've dealt with back problems, Jan-Michael Gambill, a friend of Dent, and the retired Justin Gimelstob, there haven't been any setbacks.

"I went there to get a couple of matches and test it out and see if I could serve for just one match, and I happened to go there and play doubles," Dent said. "It was great. I just didn't want to push it too much. I've been practicing, and my back hasn't stopped me from doing anything for one day so far. Everything is just moving as planned."

Dent does core exercises or "regular maintenance" and tries to lift weights three times a week. Recently, he's hit serves for anywhere between 30 and 45 minutes a day. He hasn't been able to train fully, though it's not because of the back. A nagging injury to his right wrist kept him from going full tilt on the baseline, and a right knee injury surfaced, too.

"The rest of my body is playing catch-up to where I was in 2006," he said.

Phil Dent said his son is striking the ball and serving even better than before, and is in better shape. The younger Dent's best results at a major came at Wimbledon in 2005 and the U.S. Open two years earlier, reaching the fourth round. Getting a couple of wins early in the comeback would make things easier, according to mentor Nick Bollettieri.

"If he could get one or two victories, that might help him a lot mentally and get his body to relax a little bit, too, because the more unsure you are, the more you seem to tense up a little bit, and that's what you don't want to happen to him," Bollettieri said. "If he can serve like he did before, we all know he can volley, it's going to be pretty interesting because I don't know of many serve-and-volleyers on the circuit."

Dent, at times hampered by his backhand and no Plan B, isn't giving himself a deadline. If he's healthy and not winning or not ranked where he feels he should be, he intends to call it quits sooner than later. During his layoff, he had a "great time" teaching tennis to kids, and he wouldn't mind working with U.S. juniors in the future.

No matter what happens on the court, Bollettieri is a fan.

"Taylor can be a role model for a lot of people in life," he said.

Ravi Ubha is a frequent contributor to ESPN.com.