The season starts tonight, two months later than usual after the shortest offseason in the four major sports history, the Brooklyn Nets at home against the Golden State Warriors.

Tonight.

Kevin Durant against his old team.

We get Katie and Kyrie of the regular season.

Also, Steph Curry is back for Golden State and the Lakers battle the Clippers.

Is LeBron A.

D and company begin defense of their title.

They get the rings tonight with the Clippers looking on Lakers favorite to win another ring this season.

Here's Dave McMenamin.

Yeah, Cork the champagne.

Cease the confetti.

Stop the celebration.

The longest season in MBA history was followed by the shortest offseason the sport has ever seen.

Time for the Lakers to get back to work comes there.

Repeat Dream will be determined by LeBron James and Anthony Davis.

Primarily James lobs it up.

Then Davis throws it down.

LeBron's embarking on his 18th season and is about to turn 36.

Not like age has ever stopped him before.

Booth.

Bron.

Say it with your chest on a D.

Signed a new deal to continue manning the middle.

It's mad at the rim, but this several there supporting pieces have been swapped out.

Dennis Shrewder arrived in the trade for David Greene, making up for Rajon Rondo's departure.

Sixth Man of the year Montrezl Harrell Salter down the hall at Staples Center, Mawr than filling the void created by Dwight Howard signing with Philadelphia JaVale McGee was traded to make room for Marc Gasol and Wesley Matthews left the M V P to come West.

Got that?

Well, get this.

They are light years ahead of every other team right now in the Western Conference duck.

All those moves only amped up expectations.

It's championship or bust.

Banner number 18 for the Lakers to pass the Celtics ring number five for LeBron to draw even with Kobe Magic and Duncan Challenge is about to begin.

Oh, thank you, Dave.

Moments ago, LeBron James taking the Twitter, announcing his excitement about tonight's ring ceremony.

Wow, Ring night, man.

Just hit me, man.

Oh, man.

Hate my family.

Friends and fans won't be there to witness it, though.

Nevertheless, I can't believe I'm ringing it up again.

Dave McMenamin Back to work with us now.

Dave, what are you hearing about the plan for LeBron's workload earlier this season, starting with tonight's opener against the Clippers.

Yeah, J.

It's his 18th opening night, fourth ring night, and I think a little covered storyline of last season with the Lakers and year 17 was it was the least amount of minutes he's played in his career.

So certainly his partnership with Frank Vogel began with an eye towards the long term.

Certainly, the production didn't fall off.

He was second in the league an M v P voting.

He won finals M v p.

But LeBron told us during the preseason that this will be a collaborative process between himself, his trainer, longtime trainer and trusted trainer Mike Man.

See us, the Lakers coaching staff and the rest of the Lakers medical team.

But bear in mind, LeBron's philosophy has always been.

If I'm healthy, I'm playing.

And when you think about him signing this to your extension in the offseason, eyeing potentially the end of the road, he's gonna wanna play as many games as possible because it's not just about accumulating championships.

At this point, he could catch Kareem Abdul Jabbar on the all time scoring list.

If he keeps staying in the lineup.

That is true.

That is true.

And you mentioned Frank Vogel Lakers with wholesale changes to their championship roster this offseason, most notably the added Montrose, Harrell and Dennis Schroder.

How will Vogel work them into the fold?

Yeah, certainly, I think if you look at the starting line up compared to last year, you can pencil in LeBron James.

You could pencil in Anthony Davis.

You could probably pencil in contagious Caldwell Pope, even though he was limited by injury during the preseason.

So it's all about those other two spots.

Certainly, Marc Gasol has distinguished himself as the front runner for the starting center position.

His passing ability out of the high post gives the Lakers a secondary playmaker that they didn't have on last year championship team.

And certainly he's up there and age himself.

But he knows how to manage his body, go through championship runners and showed a couple of years ago in Toronto.

The question is, what do they do with that extra wing position?

We saw Cow, whose must start some games.

We saw Dennis Schroder start some games we saw Wesley Matthews starts, um, games.

That's gonna be the roster math that Frank Vogel will reveal.

And he told us I'm not gonna reveal my starting lineup till I have Thio and that's gonna be half hour before tip off tonight against the Clippers Lakers taking on Kawhi, Leonard and crew.

10.

Eastern LeBron, 10 and 15 against CO I in his career, by the way, Dave McMenamin.

Thank you, brother.

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