LeBron James continues to dominate the headlines even after being knocked out of the playoffs after hinting he could retire, following the Game 4 loss to the Denver Nuggets.
There has been a lot of debate on whether James would really walk away from the game and NBA insider Shams Charania gave his thoughts on the matter.
“My sense is LeBron could have two years left remaining in his career,” Charania said. “I do think that the workload of the season, everything that has gone into the year — just a few months ago, he could have had season-ending surgery on that tendon. He’s had to have such a big load on this team as far as how much he’s gotta carry on a night-to-night basis. Going into year 21, I think how the Lakers manage this roster, how they’re trying to beef up this team, I think that’ll be very interesting to monitor. There’s certainly an expectation that he’s gonna continue playing. He’s got two years left on his Lakers deal… It would be a true surprise if he really did actually retire. But listen he’s got enough money to do so, but there are a lot of reasons why it doesn’t really make a ton of sense.
“There’s certainly an expectation that he’s gonna continue playing, he’s got 2 years left on his Lakers deal… It would be a true surprise if he really did actually retire”@ShamsCharania on the chances LeBron James retires now 🗣️#RunItBack pic.twitter.com/iIfdxV9Gal
— FanDuel TV (@FanDuelTV) May 23, 2023
As Charania says, it doesn’t really make a whole lot of sense that James would retire now. A couple of reasons have been floated around as to why he still chose to say that, with one of them being that he might be pressuring the Los Angeles Lakers to acquire Kyrie Irving. Others include that he is just frustrated with how the season ended and also that he is trying to deflect attention from the fact that he just got swept.
Retirement Does Seem Very Unlikely For LeBron James In 2023
A source close to LeBron told Mark Medina that they don’t see James retiring just yet. It just doesn’t make sense that he would walk away when his son is just a year away from entering the league and LeBron is still playing at a high level too. He himself claimed he is better than 90-95% of the players today and one can argue that number could be higher.
Despite almost certainly requiring surgery this offseason, he still averaged 24.5 PPG, 9.9 RPG, 6.5 APG, 1.1 SPG, and 1.1 BPG in these playoffs. Sure, those aren’t vintage LeBron numbers but they are still pretty good. The Lakers certainly want him back and it would be a massive shock if he’s not playing for them next season.
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