LeBron James Explains Big Difference Between Modern Game and Previous Eras

LeBron James says players are dealing with different injuries than they were in the 80’s and 90’s. | Mind the Game / YouTube

Tyrese Haliburton joined LeBron James as the guest host of the Mind the Game podcast this week. Haliburton discussed what it was like to learn that he was the odd Olympian out on Team USA and also talked about his rehabilitation process as he tries to get back on the court after he tore his achilles in Game 7 of the 2024 NBA Finals.

Injuries were a big topic of conversation during the podcast with the Olympic teammates talking about how difficult it is to stay healthy during a long NBA season and whether the league should reconsider their minimum games played benchmark for major awards.

It was during this part of the conversation where LeBron brought up a big difference between the modern game and the NBA of a few decades ago.

"The game is different," said James. "I want people and our fans to understand that playing 82 games in the 80's and 90's is not the same as playing 82 games in the 2020's. It’s just not. The way we play. The level of pace. The level of the speed we're playing at, it’s a different game now. It's a totally different game. It’s a lot of soft tissue injuries that's happened now because of it. I hope we can get a handle on that as well because that's big in our game. I think when I first came in the league. Some of the biggest concern for injuries was like a high ankle sprain. You was afraid to step on somebody's ankle because there were just four-five guys sitting in the paint. So guys with athleticism: myself, Tracy McGrady, Vince Carter to name a couple guys. Sometimes you were afraid to take off into the lane because there was four, five guys sitting in the paint. If you land on somebody's ankle, you get a high ankle sprain you're out 4-6 weeks."

"Now that's really much, you don't see that you see that," explained James. "The game is so spread open. There's so much pace. Now you see the new high ankle sprain is the calf. Hopefully we get a handle on that from a medical standpoint but I just want the fans to understand the game is a little different and as NBA players we definitely want to be out there as much as possible."

It sounds like he's just saying there are different injuries to deal with, but when you combine that with pointing out the speed and pace being faster, you can feel it turning into a whole thing.

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