Los Angeles Lakers superstar Lebron James has been dealing with knee sorenesswhich he originally missed about 10 days for and we recently had new comments from him and head coach Frank Vogel. Lebron commented that he essentially still has knee soreness the day after games and coach Vogel has said that Lebron truly still is day-to-day currently with the knee soreness so just how risky is it for Lebron to currently be playing?
There’s three pertinent facts we need to consider.
Firstly there’s some root cause that is triggering that soreness we don’t know what that is and we’ll probably never know what it is. If i had a guess it’s likely some mild cartilage irritation like of the meniscus.
Secondly, Lebron has said that this is an issue that he can manage during the season but it will require the off season where he is not playing to ramp down activity for him to fully address it, similar to his high ankle sprain.
Thirdly, Lebron has been more conservative this season when it comes to handling injuries. He missed nearly two weeks at the start of this season when he had that abdominal core injury and then he missed 10 days when he first was dealing with the knee soreness to try and get out in front of it.
In my opinion that’s a response to what happened last season when he tried to skip steps at the end stage rehab for his high ankle sprain and he came back in the games too quickly which ended up flaring up the ankle and he had to miss another week very close to the playoffs and he never really got even close back to his 100% self.
If the underlying anatomical issue had a high chance for getting worse combined with Lebron and longtime trainer Mike Manciacs knowledge of his body and what are acceptable parameters for his soreness and discomfort along with lebron’s new conservative approach, he very very likely wouldn’t be playing right now.
With all those three of those things, this is very likely just a mild concern that can be managed day to day and that’s exactly what Lebron and Mancias have been doing.
In the summer, they’ll ramp down activity until they fully address the issue and then lebron will go into his normal summer routine and ramp up for next season.
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Dr. Rajpal Brar, DPT, (@3cbperformance) is a physiotherapist, movement expert, strength and conditioning/fitness coach, sports scientist and mindfulness coach. He runs the LA and online based physiotherapy and athletic performance clinic 3CB Performance and you can subscribe to his Youtube channel (which posts a variety of sports injury, performance, and fitness related content).