Effects of LeBron James’ injury: Luka Doncic’s best player status becomes stronger, and Bronny in the Lakers’ rotation?
For the first time in his career, LeBron James will miss the season opener. The famous James Al-Mateen is He is reportedly dealing with sciatica which should sideline him for at least 3-4 weeks. Although the injury James suffered at the start of the season is new, it is something we may need to get used to. James is 40 years old. There is very little precedent for players remaining active at this age, let alone the star-level performances that James continued to produce last season. We probably don’t have much basketball left for a 100% healthy James.
This will be an issue the Lakers will face throughout the season. Right now, they have more pressing concerns, like figuring out how to survive the start of the season without one of their stars. So, with James now sidelined for some time, let’s take a look at some of the implications this injury has for the rest of the Lakers.
1. Could this open the door for more Bronies?
Right off the bat, the Lakers lost between 30 and 35 minutes a night at the start of the season with James sidelined. The guard they added this offseason, Marcus Smart, is currently dealing with Achilles tendinopathy, so there’s no telling how well he’ll be able to play heading into the season. To make room to bring him in, the Lakers had to waive Jordan Goodwin, the rotation guard from last season. They can’t fully rely on him health-wise, but Maxi Clipper is also dealing with a quadriceps issue. In other words, there appear to be minutes available early.
The irony here is that an injury to LeBron James could open the door for another LeBron James to play. Bronny is clearly much younger than his father. They play in different positions. But the Lakers are relatively flexible positionally. After all, the two main ball-handlers are the bigger James and Luka Doncic, both of whom have the size of a forward. In the absence of LeBron, Smart and Kleber, eight players will almost certainly play: Doncic, Austin Reeves, Rui Hachimura, Jared Vanderbilt, Gabe Vincent, Deandre Ayton, Jake Laravia and Jackson Hayes.
Most teams use nine or 10 in the regular season. Dalton Knecht is probably the main beneficiary, and it would be appropriate for the Lakers to use him just to enhance his trade value. But don’t be surprised if the Lakers give Bronny a chance early just to see if he can handle it. His rookie season was largely uninspiring, but there were positive signs in Summer League. The Lakers aren’t built for Rooney to play real minutes when healthy, but this will likely be an opportunity to see how much he grows early in the season and see if he’s worthy of more opportunities later. Of course, without knowing how well he will play in camp and Smart’s availability, none of this can be guaranteed. For all we know, one of the two guards, Nick Smith Jr. or Chris Mannon, could have impressed enough to grab those early opportunities.
2. Who will start in LeBron’s place?
We came into camp reasonably certain that four of the Lakers would start: James, Donjic, Reaves and Ayton. The competition appears to be between Smart and Hachimura, but Jared Vanderbilt has a fringe case as well. While Smart is the more decorated defender, he is better suited to guarding bigger players at this stage of his career. That’s less of a need for this Lakers roster, while Vanderbilt is better at defending guards. He’s a worse offensive player, but hey, the Lakers can probably provide some scoring.
If Smart is healthy enough to start on Opening Day, the organic solution here might be to start him and Hachimura. Then, when James returns, the Lakers can use the information from the first batch of games to make an informed, long-term decision. However, if they’re concerned about Smart’s defense of speedy guards, it might make sense to give Vanderbilt a longer look now. Hachimura’s shooting may be essential to the offense in James’s absence, so this may be a matter of stylistic preference over defense. Additionally, if the Lakers are leaning toward bringing Smart off the bench, keeping the older player in the role would likely be beneficial.
3. Get MVP odds on Luka
You’ve all heard the noise by now. Luka Doncic is at the best of his life. He’s ready to prove the Mavericks wrong in trading him. This was all true before James’ downfall, but what has changed is his immediate statistical upside. The Lakers have as much ball handling as any team in the world NBA. Even if Dončić has the best season of his career, it may not show up statistically because he will likely have the ball less frequently next to James and Reeves than he did in Dallas. If you’re looking for a reason to doubt his MVP nomination, this is it.
Yes, James should return reasonably early in the season, but narratives are shaping up quickly. If Dončić storms out of the gate hitting a 30-point triple-double carrying an undermanned Lakers team, it will attract a ton of attention. Even if he doesn’t maintain that volume after James returns, narratives matter in MVP races. He now has a chance to grab the early lead with the entire league watching. Dončić has longer MVP odds than either of the previous winners, Nikola Jokic and Shai Gilgeous-Alexander. The best price on the board, as of Thursday evening, was +400 at Bet365. Whether or not those odds are fair is debatable, but I’d say Dončić is slightly more likely to win the MVP award today than he was yesterday.