Los Angeles Lakers star LeBron James recently had some eye-opening comments as after a loss to the Oklahoma City Thunder, he bluntly stated that they are a championship team and his currently is not.
The Thunder are the defending champs and look to be on their way to winning another, while the Lakers sit tied for fifth in the West after an up-and-down first half.
The Lakers certainly have the talent to compete though, led by James, Luka Doncic and Austin Reaves. But all three of those stars have missed significant time so far this season, as have a number of key role players.
That hasn’t allowed the Lakers to build continuity, so James is hoping they can get healthy in the second half and make a run at competing in a loaded Western Conference.
“Most important for our ball club right now is health. I can’t state it any more clear,” LeBron said during his All-Star Game press conference. “Not quite sure how many games we’ve had where we’ve had a full roster. We’re over the halfway point and there’s not been many games. Obviously I know it’s been a lot more than over half, for sure, and probably even plus that.
“Our success is going to come down to obviously our health. Our coaching staff putting us in the right position, I think they’re going to give us a game plan every night. But when it comes down to what we have to work with, we have to actually go out and see it. We haven’t been privy to having that opportunity much this year.”
Despite his uncertain future, James’ sole focus is on the rest of this season, which is reaching its home stretch after the All-Star break.
“No. We’re gearing up toward the postseason. It has nothing to do with that,” James said of his focus. “Same motivation. Same mind factor. We’ve gotten past the marathon and the sprint is about to start. I think everybody understands that.”
LeBron was also asked what this Lakers team of capable of, a question he couldn’t really answer due to all of their injuries in the first half.
“It’s hard to say because this is a new group. We added DA and Marcus and Jake, just got a new acquisition on our ball club a couple games ago. It’s too hard to really say what we’re capable of,” he admitted. “I know that when we’ve played some of our best basketball of the season, we’ve looked very good. On the other side, when we’ve been terrible, we’ve looked disgusting.
“So, I think the most important is, if we can get healthy, how many minutes we can be on the floor, how much chemistry we can build with this sprint starting. You would hope that you could have the regular season to kind of build that cohesiveness and things of that nature, but I’m hoping that, if we can get healthy, we can start to build that.”
LeBron James remains uncertain about future
James is in his 23rd season and the final year of his Lakers contract, which makes it natural to question how much longer he will continue playing.
Even then 41-year-old can’t answer that right now though, as he stated during All-Star Weekend.
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