Los Angeles Lakers star LeBron James continues to be one of the best players in the NBA in his 20th season, although there’s no doubt his workload has started to take its toll.
There has never been a player that has logged this many minutes at age 38 while also remaining as elite as James has.
With that being the case though, James’ foot and ankle have given him trouble all season. LeBron has missed 14 games this season, including three just before the All-Star break due to ankle soreness.
He returned and played in the Lakers’ final game before the break and stated that the time off during All-Star Weekend would be beneficial for him.
When the Lakers returned from the break and practiced on Wednesday though, James was not present. No reason to be concerned, however, as head coach Darvin Ham says it was to just give LeBron extra rest after everything he has gone through so far this year, via Mark Medina of NBA.com:
“I gave him an extra day off. He’s had a ton on his shoulders this entire season with the [scoring] record, our ups-and-downs throughout the year, having to do another All-Star Game and be a part of All-Star Weekend again. I thought it was only right to take some extra time.”
There was a scary moment in the All-Star Game when James hit his hand on the rim going up for a block on Pascal Siakam. LeBron wound up sitting out the second half with what the team called a hand contusion.
Ham gave a positive update at practice, saying that the finger is not an issue for James although he is still managing the ankle:
“The finger is not an issue at all. We’re still managing [the ankle] but the finger is no issue.”
It is good to see that James’ finger injury is not serious considering it took place in a meaningless exhibition game.
With the Lakers currently sitting in 13th place in the Western Conference and fighting to get back in the postseason picture, they will need James to be at his very best to finish out the season and he will of course need to be as healthy as possible for that to happen.
James calls final 23 games most important of career
James himself is very aware of that as he recently called the Lakers’ final 23 regular season games the most important of his career.
LeBron has made it clear that he is not interested in missing the postseason for the second straight year, so hopefully he can stay healthy and the Lakers can rack up enough wins to qualify at least for the Play-In Tournament.
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