LeBron James says the Lakers ‘Okay’ with the Short Off Season

LeBron James and the Los Angeles Lakers became the 2020 NBA champions on October 11. Seventy-seven days later, they will regroup once again at start of the 2020-21 NBA season against the Clippers.

This off-season has been pretty inconsistent, to say the least. While teams like the Warriors and the Hawks have had a nine-and-a-half month break, the Lakers and the Heat barely got the time to recoup.

With such a short time, it is fair to assume that many players might still be fatigued. We might not see stars like LeBron James and Anthony Davis play every match. It will be interesting to see how the teams that made deep playoff runs cope up.

LeBron James on a shorter off-season

Lakers’ star and leader LeBron James recently interacted with the media. When asked about the off-season and the training camp, LeBron had a word or two about the same.

He said, “It’s just different, obviously. With the lack of games. The situation obviously with all the COVID protocol and things of that nature. It’s been a different training camp.

“For the time that we’ve had, which hasn’t been that much, I feel like we’ve put in the work and gotten better. Obviously we’re not where we want to be long term, but that’s absolutely okay because it’s a long season, it’s a long journey. I think to the credit of the guys we’ve gotten better as the days went on.”

How have the Lakers coped-up with the short off-season?

Rob Pelinka and the Lakers were very busy this off season. Last season, we might have seen multiple veterans in the Lakers’ bench. This season, however, they have been replaced by much younger players who are entering their prime.

Both Dennis Schroder and Montrezl Harrell were in teams which did not make deep playoff runs. This gives the Lakers two players who have had enough time to recover. Both the players are more than capable to step up in any game and guide the team to victory.

The Lakers with their new look roster were impressive in their pre-season games. In the pre-season we also saw LeBron and Davis make two appearances on the court. While LeBron is nowhere near to his 100%, we might see Davis having monstrous numbers. In their last pre-season game against the Suns, Davis scored 35 points with 6 out of his 7 three point attempts.

The champions start their champaign against the city rivals the LA Clippers, Dec 22, and then will face the Mavs in a Christmas day blockbuster.