LeBron's Sciatica Stole His Season Start, and the NBA Is Still Watching What Comes Next
LeBron James missed the first 14 games of the 2025-26 season. Not a few games. Not a week. Fourteen games. For a guy heading into his historic 23rd season in the league, that's a first he never saw coming.
The culprit? Sciatica that lit up his lower back and right side during summer workouts. The pain was bad enough to sideline him through Lakers training camp and into November. James didn't take the floor until November 18 in Salt Lake City, and when he finally got there, he was honest about the mental battle. "Never in my life, since I started playing the game of basketball, have I ever not started the season," he said the day before his delayed debut. "It's been a mind test, but I'm built for it."
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Here's the wrinkle that makes this whole situation even more intriguing. In June, James picked up his $52.6 million player option instead of renegotiating a new deal. That means for the first time since joining the Lakers in 2018, he's playing on an expiring contract. So he's missing time at the start of a season where he's got a clock ticking on his current deal. That's a lot of moving parts for one roster piece to manage.
Building With Luka in the Background
The Lakers brought in Luka Doncic in a midseason trade last year, and James finally gets to coalesce with him when the season kicks off. Except he's not actually kicking it off. He's joining mid-stream. The sciatica didn't just mess with his training camp and preseason prep, it complicated the entire chemistry-building timeline the Lakers were counting on heading into this season.
James' debut on November 18 marked the moment the conversation shifted from "how healthy is he?" to "what does this mean for the Lakers going forward?" When a guy in his 23rd season starts losing games to injury he's never dealt with before, the NBA takes notice.
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This article was created with AI assistance and reviewed by Seattle On Tap editorial staff. Always verify information with official team sources.