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LeBron James was non-committal when asked about his future plans following the Los Angeles Lakers' Game 5 elimination by the Minnesota Timberwolves on Wednesday. James has typically been cryptic at this point in the season throughout his career and is expected to continue playing in the NBA at the age of 40.

"There's no expectation for LeBron James to retire," said Shams Charania on The Pat McAfee Show. "I will say that my sense, my understanding is he will play at least another NBA season. You think about next year, it'll be year 23, that would set a league record. Year 23 for number 23. The All-Star game is in Los Angeles. He's potentially playing in Los Angeles. There's a lot of stars that would align for next season, potentially, if that's what LeBron James decides. He'd be 41 years old in December. He's 40 years old right now. So the expectation is he's going to be playing at least another season, but again how long?

"And the other thing is does Bryce James, his son, does that factor play into it at all? His son is going to be potentially draft eligible in 2026 next year. So if he feels at some point next year Bryce James might be an NBA player. Might be a draft eligible player, does he extend that window? I think that's the only potential carrot caveat that you think of out there that could keep LeBron James even longer than at least one more year. But we saw his answer last night, he's he was very non-committal.

"He's got a $54 million player option, so what do you do there? Do you opt in? Do you opt out? My feel is that he probably opts into that. And then from there, it's like what does the Lakers roster look like? Because this was a LeBron James at 40 years old that was playing games and playing significant minutes as a center. And I don't expect that to be in his future to be playing the center position at 41 years old. This is not sustainable for LeBron James at this point in his career"

If James continues playing, he is expected to remain with the Lakers.

"That's definitely the case," said Charania. "He hasn't indicated anything otherwise. I mean to leave Los Angeles at this point in his life in his career... I mean I guess you'd never say never you'd never say never, but all the indications would be that's where he would retire. He said it publicly that's where he would want to retire."

Via Shams Charania/ESPN

Just go away man

No ****. If he's going to retire, he's going to let everyone know about it in the form of farewell tour season. We know this due to The Decision and him being the only one to actually publicly declare himself the GOAT.

This means he’ll lose in the first round at least one more time, adding to his legacy

engelmartin wrote:This means he’ll lose in the first round at least one more time, adding to his legacy

The high point of LeBron's career was going back to Cleveland and winning a title. The low point, the Miami super team. What he does now or does next season doesn't bother me.

A funny sidebar. The Lakers now have the future that the Mavericks went out of their way to avoid. They have to figure out how to build around Luka, who's a great player, but individuals don't win titles anymore. Deep balanced teams do.

He is putting up 24/8/8 while shooting 51%. Ain't no way he should retire. He would be the best player on half the nba rosters.
I'm saying this as a Clippers fan.

Luv those Knicks wrote:

engelmartin wrote:This means he’ll lose in the first round at least one more time, adding to his legacy

The high point of LeBron's career was going back to Cleveland and winning a title. The low point, the Miami super team. What he does now or does next season doesn't bother me.

A funny sidebar. The Lakers now have the future that the Mavericks went out of their way to avoid. They have to figure out how to build around Luka, who's a great player, but individuals don't win titles anymore. Deep balanced teams do.

how the hell is his low point winning 2 championships. yal are ridiculous

No duh, he already said this. They're the Lakers so they're just waiting to bring in either Giannis or Jokic at a heavily discounted price to complete the team

ReddOktober wrote:

Luv those Knicks wrote:

engelmartin wrote:This means he’ll lose in the first round at least one more time, adding to his legacy

The high point of LeBron's career was going back to Cleveland and winning a title. The low point, the Miami super team. What he does now or does next season doesn't bother me.

A funny sidebar. The Lakers now have the future that the Mavericks went out of their way to avoid. They have to figure out how to build around Luka, who's a great player, but individuals don't win titles anymore. Deep balanced teams do.

how the hell is his low point winning 2 championships. yal are ridiculous

It was a ridiculous roster. The NBA even made rules to avoid that kind of situation happening again. It was bad for the fans. I didn't watch a single heat game when they had that 3-some. It's like the Dodgers in baseball or the old Yankees when they had a much higher payroll than anyone else. The game loses something when it's that unbalanced.

He couldn't win without a super team with two additional franchise players or the peak of a pandemic when nobody watched or wanted to play. That's his legacy. Any superstar, like Nowitzki, Joker, or Gannis, who led their own team to win one is greater than LeBron.

FreeBoosie wrote:Just go away man

Yeah he will listen to you.. also how does it effect you.. lol why you cry so much..

kalel123 wrote:No ****. If he's going to retire, he's going to let everyone know about it in the form of farewell tour season. We know this due to The Decision and him being the only one to actually publicly declare himself the GOAT.

Well he is the goat.. Kobe was terrible for years still had a farewell tour at least LeBron is still damn good..

engelmartin wrote:This means he’ll lose in the first round at least one more time, adding to his legacy

MJ added to his not even making the playoffs but ppl just say it doesn't count.. Even if he loses in the first rd again and I don't think they will if they make the right roster changes but even if he does I don't think that hurts him at all he clearly isn't in his prime but he is still playing well enough to be considered one of the better players.. Let's see how the off season goes though..

Luv those Knicks wrote:

ReddOktober wrote:

Luv those Knicks wrote:
The high point of LeBron's career was going back to Cleveland and winning a title. The low point, the Miami super team. What he does now or does next season doesn't bother me.

A funny sidebar. The Lakers now have the future that the Mavericks went out of their way to avoid. They have to figure out how to build around Luka, who's a great player, but individuals don't win titles anymore. Deep balanced teams do.

how the hell is his low point winning 2 championships. yal are ridiculous

It was a ridiculous roster. The NBA even made rules to avoid that kind of situation happening again. It was bad for the fans. I didn't watch a single heat game when they had that 3-some. It's like the Dodgers in baseball or the old Yankees when they had a much higher payroll than anyone else. The game loses something when it's that unbalanced.

That heat team was an 8th seed when he joined and they jettisoned all depth to put bosh wade and lebron together and yes if Wade's knees had been ok they might have been more dominate but come on man there was not a worse league breaking team than KD joining the 73-9 warriors it made the NBA boring we all knew if they were healthy they would win every time where as the warriors before that were really interesting because they were great but it was possible all though difficult to beat them.. They did change the rules after KD joining the warriors too they didn't let the cap spike all at once.. Also the warriors were already built gave up no depth and got KD.. Putting super teams together from scratch however is clearly far more difficult KD tried twice in Brooklyn and the suns with no luck.. Right now because of the CBA it is harder to put stronger teams together for sure and it is the most balance its been in a while teams like boston who mostly came together before these new rules have the advantage.. In the 90s though it was also much easier to put together a team I mean they signed pippen to a 10 year contract worth nothing in the scheme of things

I've also heard water is wet...which was not a surprise.

Luv those Knicks wrote:

ReddOktober wrote:

Luv those Knicks wrote:
The high point of LeBron's career was going back to Cleveland and winning a title. The low point, the Miami super team. What he does now or does next season doesn't bother me.

A funny sidebar. The Lakers now have the future that the Mavericks went out of their way to avoid. They have to figure out how to build around Luka, who's a great player, but individuals don't win titles anymore. Deep balanced teams do.

how the hell is his low point winning 2 championships. yal are ridiculous

It was a ridiculous roster. The NBA even made rules to avoid that kind of situation happening again. It was bad for the fans. I didn't watch a single heat game when they had that 3-some. It's like the Dodgers in baseball or the old Yankees when they had a much higher payroll than anyone else. The game loses something when it's that unbalanced.

Please stop, you're making Wade and Bosh out to be top 5 players all-time. They had zero depth the first season they got together, LeBron had to carry those Miami teams for 4 straight years, if he did not play at an all-time level they would've never won anything.

another year of ludicrous hating, complaining and whining about lebron james on realgm. great.

Vegeta10176 wrote:

FreeBoosie wrote:Just go away man

Yeah he will listen to you.. also how does it effect you.. lol why you cry so much..

Ur the one going ham defending Ur king post by post and "I cry so much?" Just stop embarrassing urself u Bronsexual lol

FreeBoosie wrote:

Vegeta10176 wrote:

FreeBoosie wrote:Just go away man

Yeah he will listen to you.. also how does it effect you.. lol why you cry so much..

Ur the one going ham defending Ur king post by post and "I cry so much?" Just stop embarrassing urself u Bronsexual lol

Amazing how much time and energy Lebron gets from people

This isn't even a story (everyone knew he wasn't retiring) but it's got dozens of comments on Wiretap in <24 hours

Two from a guy who supposedly wants less Lebron ("just go away").

Just overwhelming how much basketball attention James gets.

Vegeta10176 wrote:

kalel123 wrote:No ****. If he's going to retire, he's going to let everyone know about it in the form of farewell tour season. We know this due to The Decision and him being the only one to actually publicly declare himself the GOAT.

Well he is the goat.. Kobe was terrible for years still had a farewell tour at least LeBron is still damn good..

True GOAT's let others do the talking. He felt the need to say it out loud himself, meaning he knows he ain't but wants to pretend he is.