On Monday evening, the Los Angeles Lakers fell back down to Earth with a blowout home loss at the hands of the Phoenix Suns. Despite playing at mostly full strength, Los Angeles was powerless to stop Phoenix throughout this game, despite the fact that Devin Booker had to exit the game early due to injury.
For a while, it looked like LeBron James' streak of double-digit scoring games, which dates all the way back to 2007, may be in jeopardy, but the Lakers shamelessly fed him the ball on several straight possessions in the fourth quarter when the game was out of reach to make sure it stayed intact.
After the game, James spoke on the foot injury that had kept him out of the previous night's game against the New Orleans Pelicans.
“It’s called old. … You just wake up with s— that you didn’t have the night before,” said James, per Dave McMenamin of ESPN on X, formerly Twitter.
James will turn 41 years old later this month, and recently became the only player in NBA history to suit up for his 23rd season in the association. So far, the results have been a mixed bag for the former four-time MVP in the 2025-26 NBA season, as he has seemed more than willing to accept and secondary or even sometimes tertiary offensive role behind Luka Doncic and Austin Reaves, but is also clearly not the same player he was once upon a time.
The good news for the Lakers is that James has been able to reenter the fray during a weak patch of their schedule, but things will start to get a bit tougher later this week when they kick off an Eastern Conference road trip. That swing will begin on Thursday evening against the Toronto Raptors at 7:30 pm ET, followed by a game vs the Boston Celtics.
