While bearing a stoic expression with both his body language and tone, Los Angeles Lakers star LeBron James offered a blunt assessment on what it meant to play his third All-Star game in LA.

“Nothing,” James said.

Pump the brakes on whether this signals any dissatisfaction with the Lakers, any suggestion that the 41-year-old James will join another team next season, or any indifference to making his 23 All-Star appearance. James stressed his apathy points toward playing at the Clippers’ home arena at Intuit Dome.

“This is not our building,” James said. “Nothing at all. This is a road game.”

It eventually might feel like a home game considering James’ global popularity and the Lakers’ strong following. When the Lakers play the Clippers in a designated road game, Lakers fans typically fill up the arena while wearing purple-and-gold gear. Clippers officials can only ensure that their own fans sit in “The Wall.” Other than that, Lakers fans and fans of the NBA’s marquee players will likely fill up the stands.

How much those cheers will go toward James will likely depend on how he actually plays in this year’s All-Star game. That will entail a round-robin tournament featuring the NBA’s American stars against the league’s international phenoms.

“Obviously, I like the East-West format, but they’re trying something,” James said. “We’ll see what happens. But it’s like the U.S. versus the World. The world is gigantic over the U.S. So I’m just trying to figure out how that makes sense. But I don’t want to dive too much into that.”

Instead, James dove into various topics before Sunday’s game after missing the league’s All-Star media session on Saturday.

James praised San Antonio Spurs guard Stephon Castle and Chicago Bulls guard Josh Giddey. James wished Chinese fans a “Happy New Year.” James complimented Portland Trail Blazers guard Deni Avdija for making his first All-Star appearance and expressed interest in visiting his native Israel. James reiterated his interest in being part of an NBA ownership group and “other ventures” during retirement.

But after repeatedly stressing uncertainty on when and where he will end his NBA career throughout the 2025-26 season, James affirmed the same message during All-Star weekend.

“I want to live. When I know, you guys will know,” James said. “I don’t know. I have no idea. I just want to live, that’s all.”

James only said generally that he plans to spend his post-NBA career “creating great vibes and fun with my family and my friends.” As for now, though, James emphasized that “I’m still locked in on what’s going on right now and our season.”

The Lakers (33-21) rank fifth in the Western Conference because Luka Dončić has become an MVP candidate and All-Star starter for his league-leading 32.8 points per game and James has delayed Father Time with his deft passing and scoring. They also have become vulnerable with an 18th-ranked defense and overlapping injuries among their stars and role players.

“Most important for our ball club right now is health.  And I can’t state it any more clearly,” James said. “Our success is going to come down to, obviously, I think our health. Our coaching staff is putting us in the right position. I think they’re going to give us a game plan every night, but when it comes to what we have to work with, we have to actually go out and see it. We haven’t been privy to having that opportunity much this year.”

James missed the first 14 games of the 2025-26 season while recovering from sciatica in his right hip and another four games to heal his left foot. Dončić has sat for 11 games, including the past three with a strained left hamstring. Lakers guard Austin Reaves became sidelined for 22 games to heal a strained left calf. Lakers forward Rui Hachimura missed a combined nine games with various ailments. The Lakers fielded 23 different starting lineups, while also integrating three offseason acquisitions (center Deandre Ayton, guard Marcus Smart, guard Jake LaRavia). The Lakers also just acquired sharpshooter Luke Kennard from the Atlanta Hawks for Gabe Vincent and a 2032 second-round pick.

Should the Lakers have a more consistently available lineup for the second half of the season, what can they accomplish? After all, James, Dončić and Reaves have only played a combined 10 games this season and have gone 7-3.

“It is hard to say because this is a new group,” James said. “We added DA, Marcus and Jake and we just got a new acquisition on our ball club a couple games ago [Kennard]. So, it’s too hard to really say what we’re capable of. I know that when we’ve played some of our best basketball this season, we look very good. On the other side, when we’ve been terrible, we’ve looked disgusting.”

The Lakers have gone 13-0 in so-called clutch games in which the outcome was decided within the final five minutes. Yet, the Lakers have also lost 13 games by double-digits. The Lakers have fared significantly better against rebuilding teams (22-8) than against teams with at least a .500 record (11-13). The Lakers own a tiebreaker over the Minnesota Timberwolves for the No. 5 seed, but they only have a 1 ½ game lead over the Phoenix Suns. With 28 regular-season games remaining, that small cushion makes the Lakers vulnerable to fall in the Play-In tournament.

“The most important is if we can get healthy, how many minutes we could be on the floor, how much chemistry we can build with the sprint starting,” James said. “You would hope that you can have the regular season and kind of build that cohesiveness and things of that nature, but I’m hoping that if we can get healthy, that we can start to build that.”

That may start with both James and Dončić playing limited minutes in Sunday’s All-Star game. Then, James may have the same apathy towards playing at Intuit Dome.

Mark Medina is an NBA insider for EssentiallySports. Follow him on X, Blue Sky, Instagram, Facebook and Threads.