LeBron James suffered a groin strain in the Lakers 111-101 loss to the Celtics on Saturday night and hes since downplayed the injury to the media.
The Lakers great left the game with 6:44 remaining in the fourth quarter and didnt return to the court.
LeBron missed 17 games with a groin injury in his first season with the purple and gold in 2018 something he thought about when the new injury occurred. He also admitted he thought about his old teammate Anthony Davis, who went down in his first game with the Mavericks with a left adductor strain.
The first thing that popped into my mind was Christmas Day my first year with the Lakers, James said. Ive been there before and I know what type of injury youre dealing with. Second thing I thought about was AD. Its crazy. I thought about AD, James said. And then Im over there just trying to see how much mobility and see if I can possibly give it a go. And I came back here and did a couple of stretches and a couple of things that ultimately knew that I was probably going to be done for the rest of the night.
James made it clear that he didnt think this injury was nearly as serious, saying there was not much concern and he would go day to day to treat it.
LeBrons new running mate Luka Doncic was asked about the level of concern for the 40-year-old, and Doncic admitted its tricky injury to deal with.
Yeah, I mean, hopefully its nothing, Doncic said. Obviously, hes gotta take his time. Those injuries I wont say [theyre] the worst, but theyre tough to deal with. So just take time. And as a team, we gotta have the next-man up mentality.
King James has played in 58 of the Lakers 62 games through Saturday and is averaging 25 points on 51.7 percent shooting (38.4 percent from 3), 8.2 rebounds, 8.5 assists in 2024-25.
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