There are some major questions about the health of Los Angeles Lakers star Anthony Davis, although he maintains he’s just being cautious with his Achilles injury.
Davis spoke to the media about the injury — dubbed as tendonosis in his right Achilles tendon — for the first time on Thursday.
“I think every other game … I’ve wanted to play in. This is just a different circumstance with it being an Achilles. If it was a quad or finger, anything like that, I wouldn’t mind playing,” Davis told reporters, per Dave McMenamin of ESPN. “But I just don’t really want to play around with an Achilles. Today was the first day we were able to practice, get some run-in with some guys to really test it out.
“I just don’t want to play a game where I still feel it and then get hurt and now I’m out for the playoffs or whatever or for multiple weeks, where it’s something I can’t control and maintain right now where you miss two games or three games early on in the season or midseason and be ready to go for the rest of the season.”
Davis was off to a sluggish start to the season, by his standards at least. His points (22.3), rebounds (8.6) and blocks (1.9) per game are all down from his First-Team All-NBA campaign a year ago.
Anthony Davis Has Been Banged Up This Season
GettyAnthony Davis of the Los Angeles Lakers.
Davis earned the tag of injury-prone in the past and the shortest offseason in NBA history certainly did not help his cause. He has had minor injuries throughout the season to his right leg before the Achilles problem, including contusions to his quad, knee and calf, as well as an ankle sprain, plus a right adductor strain and a lower back problem.
Davis revealed that he had been dealing with the issues for a couple of weeks and didn’t get the diagnosis until recently undergoing an ultrasound.
“Continued to be really sore. Pushing off. Even walking, obviously running, jumping, anything like that, I would feel it,” Davis said. “So it’s more so just soreness and just letting it calm down.”
Anthony Davis was encouraged by results of an ultrasound on his Achilles, and explained he’s dealing with soreness, not pain.
“Pushing off, even walking, obviously running and jumping and things like that, I will feel it. So it’s more so just soreness and letting it calm down.”
Frank Vogel: Lakers Not Playing Good Enough
The Lakers have won six games in a row, but have been pushed to overtime in three consecutive games against struggling teams in the Thunder and Pistons, which were both missing key players.
“These are the toughest games to play. When you have a sub-.500 team that comes in with guys out, everybody on their team is getting extra opportunities. They get an opportunity to be the go-to guy,” Lakers head coach Frank Vogel told reporters on Wednesday night.
Coach Vogel praises Wesley Matthews energy and overall performance against the #Thunder, talks about @KingJames‘ minutes and more.
The Lakers have the second-best record in the NBA at 20-6, behind only the Utah Jazz. But Vogel knows his team has to be better.
“The message to the team was, ‘Good enough, but not good enough,'” Vogel said. “We’re good enough to win these games, but by our standards, we’re not playing good enough. So we got some light work in [Thursday] to hopefully improve that execution while trying to keep them fresh.”
Frank Vogel discusses the #Lakers workload following three straight overtime games.
The Lakers will look to get the job done in four quarters as they square off against the Grizzlies on Friday night in a nationally televised matchup.
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Lakers Star Anthony Davis Breaks Silence on Latest Injury