Frank Vogel says Anthony Davis looks physically ‘imposing’ to start training camp

Things could have hardly ended worse for Anthony Davis last season. After a regular season campaign in which he struggled to find his rhythm due to injuries, Davis had to watch from the sidelines as the Los Angeles Lakers were eliminated by the Phoenix Suns in the first round of the postseason.

The Lakers have some insurance in the event that Davis has another injury-plagued season in Russell Westbrook, but Davis is apparently doing everything he can to prepare himself for his long road to redemption. In a recent interview with Allie Clifton and Chris McGee on Spectrum SportsNet’s “Lakeshow” podcast, Frank Vogel shared that Davis looks physically ready for the season to start:

“He put a lot of work this offseason into his body. A lot of work. And we had a moment, maybe two weeks ago, where he had been training at home, and we had a conversation about ‘these are some of the concerns we have with our team, we think we’re good here, we think we’re good there,’ and then he comes in for a workout, and it was the first time we had kind of seen him for a while, and his body looked imposing.

“We all just looked at each other like ‘we’re gonna be really good this year.’ Just looking at that guy right there, we’re gonna be really good this year.”

Obviously Davis’ offseason preparation won’t make him immune to injuries this season — LeBron James takes care of his body as well as any athlete that’s ever lived and he missed 27 games last season because Solomon Hill dove head-first into his leg. But the offseason is where players lay the foundation for the grueling, 82-game schedule, and if Davis looks good enough for Vogel to say something, that’s a promising sign.

Vogel’s comments also somewhat put to rest the unfounded claims that Davis was taking it easy in the summer. It turns out that you can have a successful offseason without documenting all of your workouts on social media — who knew?

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