Durbin Ham said lakers We had hoped to treat the final two games of preseason as dress rehearsals for the regular season, but with news that Anthony Davis didn’t even make the trip to Sacramento for Friday night’s contest, that job fell through. It got even more complicated.
Anthony Davis (behind) did not make the trip to Sacramento for precautionary reasons.
— Dan Woike (@DanWoikeSports) October 14, 2022
As first reported by Dan Woike of los angeles times, Davis remained in Los Angeles due to back pain and was ruled out of the Lakers’ preseason finale. Davis made no mention of his physical problems when asked about his condition after Wednesday’s game against Minnesota. He said, “I feel good physically, my body feels good.” But something changed in those two days, and the Lakers began to act with due caution.
Davis missed two games with a strained back early in the preseason and returned with two great performances against the Warriors and Wolves, but this throws a bit of cold water on Davis’ redemption season potential. Even if the Lakers deemed it “precautionary,” missing half of the preseason would be a sting after Davis missed at least half of the regular season in both 2020-21 and 2021-22.
AD’s absence is also preventing the Lakers from getting any meaningful information out of this final preseason game. Dramatic decision to bench Russell Westbrook Running a veteran point guard on the second unit, evaluating the starting lineup is much more difficult without Davis in the fold.
Of course, as long as Davis is healthy and ready for the first game against the Warriors, it doesn’t matter that the team missed a data point against the Kings. Ideally, this would be his one-game absence, and Friday night wouldn’t be his case as a test of how the Lakers play without big stars on a regular basis during his season.
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