Pro Athletes Are Betting on Increasingly Sophisticated Recovery Tech

From neuromuscular stimulation to pressurized and vibroacoustic chambers, NFL, NBA and MLB athletes are turning to a new class of tools for high performance

The postgame ice bath isn’t going anywhere, but it’s no longer enough. 

Across the NFL, NBA and MLB, a growing number of professional athletes are implementing recovery protocols with technologies that target the nervous system, cellular repair and sleep quality at a level of precision that traditional sports medicine couldn’t previously reach. 

The results, both anecdotal and measured, are compelling enough that some of the most recognizable names in professional sports are investing in them.

Electrical Stimulation On Another Level

Electrical stimulation has been used in physical therapy for decades. Still, that familiar twitch from a TENS or standard e-stim unit barely scratches the surface of what the nervous system needs to rebuild after an injury. 

Those traditional e-stim devices run on alternating current, which is a waveform that reverses direction continuously, limiting how deeply it can engage the neuromuscular system. Dr. Sharif Tabbah, founder of Alkeme Sports Rx, who has worked with multiple NFL players through ACL and Achilles recoveries, among them Malik Nabers, Antonio Gibson and Kenny McIntosh, told Athletech News that there’s something more effective.

As a physiotherapist and certified strength and conditioning specialist, Dr. Tabbah uses a device called the NeuBie from NeuFit that utilizes direct current. He explains that it flows in a single direction and carries significantly more force behind it. 

“It very closely emulates the waves that you naturally have in your body during muscular contraction,” Dr. Tabbah told ATN.

The practical effect is a more efficient recruitment of motor units — the connection points between neurons and muscle fibers — which deteriorate rapidly after injury.

“After an injury, you might be operating at 50% of your motor neurons recruiting,” explained Dr. Tabbah. “By using something like direct current, we’re able to recruit more — maybe get it up to 60%, 70% — and start to turn the lights on.”

He explained that neurological reactivation matters most in the rehabilitation of lower-body injuries, where a phenomenon called quad avoidance — the body’s subconscious refusal to load the knee after injury — can stall recovery for weeks. 

Using a dynamometer to track force output, Dr. Tabbah has noted a 25% increase in quad strength output in a single patient over just two weeks of Neubie-assisted training. He told ATN that, within individual sessions, athletes have performed movements they couldn’t tolerate 10 minutes earlier.

The device also helps improve sensory stimulation. By switching the Neubie to a higher frequency, Dr. Tabbah can use it to intercept pain signals rather than drive motor recruitment, which gives the brain something else to process.

By surrounding the affected area with pads set to a high frequency and having the athlete move through whatever pattern has been painful, Dr. Tabbah works to gradually raise their pain threshold and reduce the noxious stimuli that have been limiting their movement.

He also stacks the Neubie with other modalities to compound its effect. Pairing it with blood flow restriction, which drives muscle adaptation under lower loads by restricting venous outflow. For Achilles repair cases, he combines the Neubie with the AlterG anti-gravity treadmill to allow athletes to train movements their bodies couldn’t otherwise tolerate at full load.

“We’re giving them two benefits to help improve their ability to perform that calf raise,” he says, noting the result is a meaningful compression of the timeline for restoring functional movement, whether that’s walking, running, jumping, or more explosive work like pogos and skipping patterns.

Pressurized Recovery

While neuromuscular tools address the structural and mechanical side of recovery, hyperbaric oxygen therapy (HBOT) takes a different approach, flooding the body with oxygen at elevated atmospheric pressure to accelerate tissue repair and reduce inflammation at the cellular level. 

HBOT has been used in clinical settings for decades to treat wounds and traumatic brain injuries, but its adoption in professional sports has accelerated alongside a broader shift toward proactive recovery.

Élevé, a recovery technology company, has become one of the go-to resources for athletes across multiple leagues. Former NBA All-Star Gordon Hayward, Denver Nuggets guard Jamal Murray and San Francisco 49ers linebacker Fred Warner all use Élevé’s hyperbaric chambers as part of their regular recovery.

Hayward, who has navigated significant injuries across his career, frames it as a matter of professional responsibility. 

“Recovery is instrumental, especially when your health is how you make money,” he’s said. “It’s very important to take advantage of everything you can to keep that health and make sure that you can be out on the court.”

What makes hyperbaric oxygen therapy increasingly compelling in professional sports is also what modalities can be stacked inside the chamber. Dr. Chuck Morris, sports scientist and owner of Midtown Biohack in Manhattan, has a hard-shell hyperbaric unit large enough for athletes to move freely, and during a single session, he layers red light therapy targeted at the brain, vagus nerve stimulation and neuromuscular re-education simultaneously.

“Stacking all of those modalities together in that environment does anywhere from seven to 12 times efficiency than when done outside the chamber,” he told ATN, adding that HBOT floods the body with oxygen at elevated atmospheric pressure, working at the cellular level to accelerate tissue repair and reduce inflammation, making it relevant not just for acute injury, but for the cumulative wear of a long professional season.

Dallas Cowboys linebacker Rashan Gary came to Midtown Biohack for a post-season reboot, and Dr. Morris designed a four-day protocol built entirely around his nervous system. It meant three hours of treatment per day, incorporating advanced cognitive brain therapy, photobiomodulation, vagus nerve stimulation and neuromuscular re-education, with minimal movement and no load placed on the athlete’s frame. What might otherwise have taken months was condensed into less than a week.

In a testimonial, Gary shared he’d had sleep issues for three years and finally had solid nights of sleep as the protocol unfolded. “I feel brand new,” he’s said. “I’m leaving one week down way better than I came in, I wish I had done this two years ago.”

The mechanisms behind HBOT’s benefits in athletic recovery are still being studied, and researchers caution that evidence varies depending on application. But for athletes managing the cumulative toll of a long professional season, the appeal of a modality that may accelerate tissue repair and dampen systemic inflammation between games is difficult to dismiss.

The Case for Stillness

Amid intense training and games, most athletes operate at high sympathetic dominance to achieve peak performance. At that level of push, however, it becomes increasingly important to find ways for the body and mind to tap into that restorative parasympathetic state. And research is beginning to show what happens when they do. 

A study published in Sports Health found that mindfulness training in high-level athletes may improve overall well-being and reduce injury risk, pointing to the nervous system as a protective variable.

While meditation apps have made mindfulness more accessible, the tools gaining traction in professional sports go considerably further. The nearly $160,000 Ammortal Chamber stacks five different modalities in one device and has built a following among entire sports teams.

Los Angeles Angels center fielder Mike Trout uses the Ammortal system when the team is at home.

 “It’s a good reset because you’re not thinking about anything,” Trout has said. “I do it every day before the game and sometimes get a recovery post-game.”

The Washington Commanders have incorporated Ammortal into their official recovery center, a decision made at the organizational level that reflects how performance staffs are driving the adoption of advanced recovery technology.

Jacob Baer of Ammortal has noted that trainers working closely with the system have reported athletes seeing a 20 to 25% increase in both deep sleep and heart rate variability. These two biomarkers are common proxies sports scientists assess to grasp athletes’ rate of recovery and capacity to perform.

A study looking at the impact of vibroacoustic stimulation backs up those anecdotal findings. 

Researchers have reported seeing increased high-frequency heart rate variability — a direct marker of parasympathetic tone — particularly in athletes whose physiology was most affected by intense exertion. Notably, researchers concluded the effect was likely driven by direct physiological impact rather than merely psychological relaxation, lending the approach more credibility than a simple wind-down tool might warrant.

The investor roster shows how much Ammortal continues to impress athletes. Freddie Freeman, Alex Bregman, Garrett Stubbs, George Kittle, Matt Chapman and Olympic gold medalist Bode Miller have all put money into the company.

The Bigger Picture

The athletes and practitioners investing in these tools are responding to the fact that professional sports careers are short, injury risk is constant and the margin between playing and not playing is often smaller than it appears. Even these advanced pieces of technology won’t eliminate that risk, but for the athletes banking on it, it’s narrowing the gap.

Dr. Tabbah has certainly seen the difference when measuring force output intermittently during a recovery protocol period.

“The help of the Newbie is dramatic,” he told ATN. “We’re able to see faster jumps than we would normally with patients who aren’t using it.”