“Full season with Luka. For real. Like I get a full season with Luka.” During the media day, LeBron James put any rumors of tension between the two Lakers superstars to rest. After the mid-season trade, the 40-year-old was excited about sharing the first training camp with Luka Doncic. The team is banking on the star duo to deliver the championship. However, there is a hurdle in their very first step.

The injury to the 4x NBA champion is not good news. A nerve irritation in the glute was why he missed the first training camp practice. However, reporter Andy Kamenetzky sees a silver lining in this situation. “Look, if the price of getting LeBron available for the majority of the regular season is sacrificing the preseason, you do that every day of the week and twice on Sunday.” Entering the record-breaking 23rd season in the league, health is paramount for the Akron native.

Recalling last year’s December slump of LeBron James, Kamenetzky was okay, if the 4x Finals MVP did miss the entire pre-season “And again, if it avoids what we saw last year where the overwork, forget perhaps leading to where we are right now, it may have led to that period where LeBron needed to take a couple weeks away from the team to physically and mentally recharge. If you can potentially avoid all of those things by essentially, uh, again sacrificing a lot of the preseason, you do it.”

For context, from the end of November to mid-December last year, King James had one of the worst stints of his career. Shots wouldn’t fall in for him. In the 6 games he started, he scored more than 20 points just once. It was against the Wolves in the early December game, where LeBron would only score 10 points. Interestingly, the reason behind his low scoring and efficiency drop was his missing all 19 of his attempts from beyond the arc.

The team then asked LeBron James to step away to focus on recovery. He recently agreed and later stated after returning, “I had an opportunity to take more days and get my mind, body and everything where I wanted it to be for tonight,” James continued. “And it worked out.” That’s why the host of Locked on Lakers, Andy Kamenetzky, was on board with the 21x All-Star missing out on the first preseason game, although he did call it “not the most ideal way.”

It’s not ideal since the preparations are already underway. Pictures and videos from the first training out, and the players had “Obsession” tops, and it had 18 in it. The Purple and Gold are setting their sights on the 18th banner. “Rob [Pelinka] has a word of the season, a word of training camp every year,” JJ Redick said. The Coach also explained the meaning of the one word on the shirt. “Last year was details, this year is obsession. Obviously, you saw the shirt, you know that the one eight was part of that, which is what we’re all after. We’re all after that 18th banner.”

LeBron James and his motivation for the next season

Last season was Redick’s debut as a coach. Plus, the team made the mid-season blockbuster trade and brought Luka Doncic to Los Angeles. The result? The top 3 finish in the West, winning 50 games, just the second time in 14 years. The team wanted to build on it and made savvy additions such as Marcus Smart, DeAndre Ayton, and Jake LaRavia. Going into the 23rd season, LeBron James seems ready to take the challenge.

“Seeing what Luka was doing in EuroBasket this summer. Everyone’s talking about his body and how well in shape he is, and all that—another season under the belt with the coaching staff. We had one year, the first year, JJ and his coaching staff. So we get another full year of that. … We get to start right from day one.” This will mark the first time the two will undergo training camp together, and they want to do better than last year.

In the off-season, LeBron opted for a $52.6 million offer, and Luka agreed and extended his stint with a three-year contract worth $165 million. The Slovenian also underwent a major physical transformation, signifying he is committed to the cause.