The 36-year-old four-time NBA champion missed 26 games last
season due to a right ankle injury, playing a career-low 33.4
minutes per game.
He said it took time for him to become fully fit again but he
was ready for the Lakers' new campaign, which begins against the
Golden State Warriors on Tuesday.
"I didn't do much basketball stuff for probably the first two
months of the summer, which is very rare for me, because my
ankle wasn't responding how I would like it to respond," James
said on Monday.
"(Then)... I got to a point where I didn't feel any sharp pains
anymore and my flexibility was back to where it was before.
That's when I knew I could get back on the floor.
"I don't play the game thinking about injuries," he added. "And
I also feel worse when I play low minutes."
Coach Frank Vogel said the forward was very unlikely to play all
82 of the Lakers' regular season games, though "we're not going
to pre-script X amount of nights off."
"In some ways if he stays over there (on the bench) too long and
he gets cold, it's worse for him to get back in there (on the
court)," Vogel added. "Especially since he's been playing this
type of rotation for so long."
(Reporting by Manasi Pathak in Bengaluru; editing by John
Stonestreet)
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