Lakers Injury Report: Darvin Ham Cagey About LeBron James' Availability Vs Wiz
Your Los Angeles Lakers may be without their best offensive player tonight, when they’ll host one of the two worst teams in the NBA.
Ahead of this evening’s slated 7:30 p.m. tipoff against the 9-49 Washington Wizards, second-year Lakers head coach Darvin Ham revealed that LA superstar combo forward LeBron James was merely a game time decision to play at all due to a lingering left ankle peroneal tendinopathy, per Jovan Buha of The Athletic.
It makes sense to sit James. At 39 years old and playing his 21st NBA season, the 20-time All-Star and four-time NBA champ has accrued more league mileage than almost anybody in history, and would be playing on the second night of a back-to-back tandem of games. The Wiz are terrible, and LA is a -9.5 point favorite even with The Chosen One’s status up in the air.
In 37 minutes of action yesterday, James scored 34 points against the Clippers on 13-of-21 shooting from the floor (7-of-12 from deep) and 1-of-1 shooting from the charity stripe. He also dished out eight dimes, pulled down six boards, and blocked two shots.
The 6'9" vet is the 32-28 Lakers' top scorer, averaging 25.2 points on .526/.408/.736 shooting splits, 7.9 assists, 7.1 rebounds, and 1.3 steals per contest.
