LeBron James is at a sort of crossroads in his NBA career this offseason. He could stay with the Los Angeles Lakers on a new contract, join another team or retire. Most people around the league don’t think he will retire this offseason, but it remains a possibility, at least hypothetically speaking.
If he doesn’t retire, one question on people’s minds is how many more seasons he will end up playing. Some have said that they feel James could last as many as five more seasons, but it looks extremely unlikely he would want to play that much longer.
According to NBA insider Marc Stein, James playing one more season is more likely than the future Hall of Famer sticking around longer than that.
“I used to think there was even a chance that James might try to become the first player in league history to play in 25 seasons, but two well-placed league observers whose viewpoint I truly trust here insisted this week that one more season is the far smarter and safer forecast … pointing to the back and leg woes that messed with James’ offseason training last summer and ultimately sidelined him for this season’s first 14 games,” Stein wrote.
After settling into a new role as the Lakers’ third scoring option during the regular season, James upped his production during the playoffs after Luka Doncic suffered a season-ending hamstring strain. He averaged 23.2 points, 6.7 rebounds and 7.3 assists a game in the postseason and led Los Angeles to an upset of the Houston Rockets in the first round before it was swept in the second round by the Oklahoma City Thunder.
Before that, he had missed the first 14 games of the season with sciatica, and while that ailment seems to be in the past tense now, the wear and tear of 1,622 regular-season games and 302 playoff contests is undeniable. James may be openly mocking Father Time right now, but eventually, he will have to give in to the same thing every other human being eventually does — mortality.
He may be one of the two or three greatest physical specimens in the history of basketball, but eventually, his body will give out, especially if he plays long enough in the NBA.
This article originally appeared on LeBron Wire: Insider weighs in on whether LeBron James could play 25 seasons in NBA
Reporting by Robert Marvi, LeBron Wire / LeBron Wire
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
