One week after it became evident Brandon Ingram would miss the rest of the regular season, the Los Angeles Lakers announced he underwent successful thoracic outlet decompression surgery on his right arm. The procedure was performed by Dr. Hugh Gelabert at the Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center.
Prior to revealing Ingram was dealing with a Deep Venous Thrombosis (DVT) — or blood clot — in his arm, he missed two consecutive games because of right shoulder soreness. Lakers head coach Luke Walton expressed optimism Ingram would return from the initial issue.
Though, Walton also said the team wasn’t certain how Ingram sustained the injury, and mentioned he wasn’t able to lift his arm above his head without feeling pain and a pull.
In announcing Saturday’s surgery, the Lakers added Ingram is expected to make a full recovery before the start of the 2019-20 season. According to ESPN’s Dave McMenamin, he could be full-go on a basketball court within four months:
Ingram could be back on the court as soon as eight weeks, sources told ESPN, with a return to full basketball activities taking an additional four to eight weeks beyond that.
Regardless of where Ingram lands on the reported timeline, his offseason workouts will impacted to some degree. However, even if Ingram requires upwards of four months to make a full recovery, he still would be available come the start of training camp.
Despite being limited to 52 games because of a suspension, sprained ankle and now shoulder trouble/blood clot, Ingram still finished this season averaging a career-high 18.3 points and 49.7 percent shooting to go along with 5.1 rebounds and 3.0 assists.