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What playoff hopes the Lakers had took a serious hit when the left hamstring of Luka Doncic seized up on him. The MRI revealed a grade 2 strain (grade 3 is the most serious and avoiding a tear was awesome). What does this mean going forward?

1) Out for the regular season. 5 games left (about a week left) and the week of playin games which we will miss no matter what. 15 days from today, 17 from the time of injury. Typical recovery time is 3-6 weeks, often more for professional athletes. Recent cautionary tales are Aaron Gordon, Peyton Watson and Jalen Williams. We’ve seen players comeback quicker but they often are ineffective and the risk of re-injury is high. In my non professional opinion the Lakers are looking at mid May, at best, for Luka to be able to return to the court and that’s if he responds incredibly well to treatment.

2) Same leg as the calf injury he suffered last season. Both soft tissue injuries. This is something I hope and think the Lakers want to get right. A tear would be disastrous, an injury to another body part like the knee or Achilles if he compensates for the hamstring would be disastrous. This is about more than one season.

3) Lakers can’t let other issues cloud their judgement. Yes, we all want to see the trio of James, Reaves and Luka get busy in the playoffs. Yes, Reaves’ fit w/Luka is a huge question, especially in the playoffs. Of course this could be LeBron’s last dance as a Laker, or even NBA player. Again, this is about more than this season.

4) Things will be much different next season. Lakers have glaring roster holes, fixing a few in the summer could go a long way towards helping the team for years to come. This was always a long shot season with OKC at full strength, Wemby coming of age fast and Boston not taking the gap year.

5) Save the coach and player from themselves. This smacks of Riles running the team into the ground before the NBA Finals against Detroit. Coaches and players always want to push through, not having heard from Luka we can only assume he felt good enough to go but for the life of me I don’t see why he was playing at all down 31. The team needs to do better.

NOW?

5 Things: The Present vs. The Future

I said

Considering we probably were gonna lose in OKC, we brought Luka back too soon.

IF LAKERS WIN 1ST ROUND, LUKA COULD RETURN FOR 2ND ROUND