LeBron James claims he used offseason to ‘strip down the car’

NBA: Los Angeles Lakers-Media Day

Lakers star LeBron James saw his team miss the playoffs for the first time since the 2004-05 season, so he finally got some much-needed time off, and an extended offseason.

James missed more games to injury than he ever has during the course of his career, so it was assumed that he’d use it to recover and get back to full strength.

It appears that’s exactly what he did, as he spoke to reporters at media day and informed them that he fully got the opportunity to “strip down the car and actually rebuild it up.”

“I was 20. It was my second year,” James said of the last time he had this much time off between seasons during his Media Day interview with Spectrum SportsNet, as transcribed by LeBronWire. ” First of all, the beginning of the summer was very challenging. I haven’t been off that long since my second year in the league when I was 20 years old. Once I settled in, I realized that there’s always something good in something someone thinks is bad. Also, I got an opportunity to rest my body. I haven’t been able to strip down the car and actually rebuild it back up for the long haul. I was very excited about that. It’s been a long time since I got to spend that much time with my family as well. Going to the Finals over and over and over, as Big Game (talking to James Worthy) would attest to and then adding the Olympics, I played in 3 Olympics during that time as well.”

It’ll be interesting to see how that stripping down affects James’ load management plan this season.

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