As an increasing number of accidents pile up all through the playoffs — the — LeBron James sounded off on the league’s condensed schedule this season on Twitter on Wednesday.

James mentioned that the rise in accidents gamers are going through aren’t simply “a part of the sport,” however slightly resulting from lack of relaxation.

As for the monetary facet of the argument, one thing that was considerably harm final season when the NBA needed to transfer right into a bubble, James isn’t having it.

The 2020-21 season kicked off on December 22, simply 72 days after the Los Angeles Lakers gained final season’s NBA Finals at Walt Disney World. That formally made it the shortest offseason in league historical past, beating the earlier report by a whopping 55 days.

It additionally was the shortest offseason among the many 4 main males’s skilled sports activities leagues in the USA, surpassing three earlier NHL data.

When that was introduced, .

The NBA will revert again to a standard mid-October begin subsequent season. The final doable date for an NBA Finals recreation this season is July 22, simply at some point earlier than the rescheduled Tokyo Olympics are set to kick off.

Ought to a recreation be performed that day, that would depart roughly three months between the tip of the season and the beginning of subsequent season. Whereas that’s longer than the earlier offseason, it should nonetheless be shorter than a standard offseason — much more so for these gamers competing for Staff USA or others in Japan.

Had been accidents truly up this season?

Statistically, sure.

Based on , the common variety of gamers sidelined per recreation resulting from harm — not resulting from any COVID-19 protocol points or just relaxation — was 5.1. That’s the highest that determine has ever been because it began being tracked again within the 2009-10 season. The final earlier report was 4.8, which implies that accidents had been up throughout the board by about 5%.

It’s worse for the league’s prime gamers, too.

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, this season’s All-Stars missed 19% of video games, which is the very best proportion in a single season in league historical past. On common, All-Stars missed 13.7 regular-season video games every.

Although each harm and each participant is totally different, there’s no denying that gamers had been extra injury-prone this season.

A number of league stars are actually sidelined within the postseason, too. Leonard, the Clippers mentioned Wednesday, . Utah Jazz guard Mike Conley will miss Recreation 5 of their sequence with the Clippers after . Kyrie Irving, the Nets introduced Wednesday, will miss . His teammate James Harden returned from a hamstring harm of his personal on Tuesday evening, however struggled severely. 

Joel Embiid has additionally missed playoff time with the Philadelphia 76ers resulting from a small meniscus tear, Lakers star Anthony Davis missed a recreation and vital components of others with a groin harm, and Donovan Mitchell missed a recreation with an ankle harm for the Jazz.

Although it’s not an harm, Suns star on Wednesday morning, too. It is unclear when he’ll be capable of return.

This, James mentioned, is precisely what he was warning about — and prompted him to apologize to followers who ought to be “seeing all of your fave guys proper now.”

James then ended his rant with a easy message to Leonard.

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