We’ve never known LeBron James to be anything but a cyborg. He’s only had one big injury before and that was when he strained his groin in his first season with the Lakers.
Any other time, he’s seemed invincible. He routinely has popped right up whenever he’s rolled his ankle. He’s played through all types of bruises and bumps.
But his latest high ankle sprain just feels…different. And it’s pretty clear, at this point, that it is. At least the Lakers seem to be treating it that way.
James returned from a high ankle sprain last week against the Kings but only played one more game against the Raptors before tweaking the ankle and having to sit again.
Since then, the Lakers have played the Nuggets and the Clippers and he missed both games. He’s also going to miss their next game against the Trail Blazers.
Frank Vogel said his absence from the team isn’t medically related but was considered somehow excused just to give him time to “stay off the ankle,” per ESPN’s Dave McMenamin.
LeBron James' absences from the Nuggets and Clippers games were considered excused by the Lakers to allow James time to "stay off the ankle," a source with knowledge of the situation tells ESPN. https://t.co/b23YxZGmWL
— Dave McMenamin (@mcten) May 7, 2021
Whew. Make of that what you will.
It doesn’t feel like it’s time for panic to set in quite yet, but there’s certainly cause for concern here. This is certainly medically related if he needs time to stay off of the ankle.
It seems like James may have come back from the ankle injury too early and tweaked it again. Obviously, we don’t know how bad the tweak was. But it was bad enough to sit him out of three straight games and make the Lakers feel like they needed to keep him off of the ankle.
Normally, this isn’t a worry. But James is getting older — he’s 36 years old. As superhuman as he is, he’s still human. This shows us that. The question is how ready will he be for the playoffs when they come around? We’ll only know the answer to that when they get here.
In the meantime, the Lakers have to hope for a speedy recovery.
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