LeBron James’ foot is set to be re-evaluated soon. What are the potential next steps?

When LeBron James returned from his foot injury — described as a “torn foot tendon” — and took the advice of the “LeBron James of feet” rather than two other medical providers who recommended he have surgery, the Lakers star stated that the injury would be reevaluated after the season to determine if surgery was required.

Well, that time has come! According to ESPN’s Dave McMenamin, LeBron will undergo an MRI at some point in the near future, and then a decision will be made as to the next steps for his foot.

In the following video, I explained what the medical team will be looking for on that MRI, what the key criteria in their medical decision-making will likely be, and the potential next steps for LeBron.

There’s a lot of gray area when it comes to medical decision-making, and hopefully this gives a little bit more insight into it. The fact that he was able to play through it without re-aggravating it (or at least not to the point where it was noticeable) and went nearly 48 minutes in game four vs Denver are good signs for his prognosis, but not the end all, be all.

If LeBron actually does need surgery, we may never know anyway, as he explicitly told reporters that they wouldn’t know if he had it or didn’t. So if he does eventually get a procedure, don’t expect to hear all that much. I’ll keep you updated here if anything does sneak out.

Dr. Rajpal Brar, DPT has a doctorate in physical therapy from Northern Arizona University, and runs his own in-person and online sports medicine and performance business, 3CB Performance, in West LA and Valencia, CA and partners with Quantum Performance in which he further combines his movement expertise and fitness training background to rehab & train elite athletes. He also works at a hospital — giving him experience with patients in the immediate healthcare setting and neurological patients (post stroke, post brain injury) — and has been practicing for over 5 years. Brar is additionally training at UCLA’s mindful awareness research center (MARC), has a background in youth basketball coaching and analyzes the Lakers from a medical and skills perspective for Silver Screen and Roll and on his own YouTube Channel. You can follow him on Twitter at @3cbPerformance.