Los Angeles Laker star Luka Doncic is out for the regular season due to the hamstring injury that forced him off the court early last night, according to ESPN’s Shams Charania:
Luka Doncic will miss the rest of the Los Angeles Lakers‘ regular season with a Grade 2 strain of his left hamstring, the team announced Friday.
Grade 2 hamstring strains sometimes require several weeks of recovery, but Doncic also has prior experience with hamstring issues. He missed four games right before the All-Star break
with another left hamstring strain, but returned to the lineup after the break.
Doncic originally tweaked his hamstring in the first half of the Laker’s 45-point loss to the Oklahoma City Thunder last night, but started the second half despite Los Angeles trailing by 31 points. Doncic injured his hamstring a second time four minutes into the third quarter, forcing him from the game.
Doncic’s agent Bill Duffy released a statement declaring their intent on seeking an exception to the NBA’s 65-game rule for All-NBA, MVP, and other award eligibility:
We intend to apply for an “Extraordinary Circumstances Challenge” to the 65-game rule. Luka missed two games this season for the birth of his second child in Slovenia… His record-breaking season deserves to be noted in the history books, despite last night’s unfortunate injury and other extraordinary circumstances. We look forward to working with the NBAPA and the league office to ensure a fair outcome in this matter.
The Lakers’ odds of winning the championship this season moved from 25-1 to 150-1 following the news, according to BetMGM.
Doncic is the NBA’s leading scorer averaging 33.5 points over 64 games this season to go with 7.7 boards and 8.3 dimes per contest.
