LeBron James Sounds Off on State of the Lakers in Video, Discusses NBA Playoff Bracket Picture

The stretch run of the 2025-26 NBA season is set to kick off after the All-Star break, and the Los Angeles Lakers are certainly hoping to improve their spot in the playoff race.

During Tuesday's episode of the Mind the Game podcast (22:20 mark), Lakers star LeBron James assessed the state of his team and made it clear that staying healthy has been the biggest issue this year following Luka Doncic's recent hamstring injury and Austin Reaves' return from a calf injury.

"We're playing good ball at times. The number-one thing for us is health," James said. "We finally got healthy with AR coming back, and then Luka goes down with the hamstring. So, that is gonna be the most important for our team."

At 33-21, Los Angeles leads the Pacific Division but ranks just fifth in the Western Conference. The team will return from the All-Star break on Friday against the Los Angeles Clippers (26-28).

James went on to admit that the Lakers' lack of depth behind their star players has plagued them for quite some time, dating back to when star big man Anthony Davis was a member of the team.

"It's kind of been like that for the last few years with our team, like, we haven't been set up to the point where we have a lot of room for error," he said. "When AD was on the team, if AD goes down, it was like, 'S--t, we don't have enough to pick that up.' Luka goes down, s--t, it's Luka. ... Luka in the MVP race right now... no one's gonna replace that. ... It's about how can we get enough minutes and chemistry on the floor and reps."

Still, James said he's been pleased with how the Lakers have overcome their injury woes so far this season, and he hopes they keep it up during the playoff race.

"For us to be 11 games, 12 games over .500 right now, top-six seed in the West, I think it's pretty damn good under the situation that we've been in," he said. "But we gotta keep going, because the West, it changes every day."