LeBron James suffered a groin strain in the Lakers’ 111-101 loss to the Celtics on Saturday night and he’s since downplayed the injury to the media.
The Lakers great left the game with 6:44 remaining in the fourth quarter and didn’t return to the court.
LeBron missed 17 games with a groin injury in his first season with the purple and gold in 2018 – something he thought about when the new injury occurred. He also admitted he thought about his old teammate Anthony Davis, who went down in his first game with the Mavericks with a left adductor strain.
“The first thing that popped into my mind was Christmas Day my first year with the Lakers,” James said. “… I’ve been there before and I know what type of injury you’re dealing with. Second thing I thought about was AD. It’s crazy. I thought about AD,” James said. “And then I’m over there just trying to see how much mobility and see if I can possibly give it a go. And I came back here and did a couple of stretches and a couple of things that ultimately knew that I was probably going to be done for the rest of the night.”
James made it clear that he didn’t think this injury was nearly as serious, saying there was “not much concern” and he would “go day to day” to treat it.
LeBron’s new running mate Luka Doncic was asked about the level of concern for the 40-year-old, and Doncic admitted it’s tricky injury to deal with.
“Yeah, I mean, hopefully it’s nothing,” Doncic said. “Obviously, he’s gotta take his time. Those injuries … I won’t say [they’re] the worst, but they’re tough to deal with. So just take time. And as a team, we gotta have the next-man up mentality.”
King James has played in 58 of the Lakers’ 62 games through Saturday and is averaging 25 points on 51.7 percent shooting (38.4 percent from 3), 8.2 rebounds, 8.5 assists in 2024-25.
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