ATLANTA — Lakers reserve big man Maxi Kleber is available to make his season debut in Saturday’s road game against the Atlanta Hawks.
The Lakers updated Kleber, who missed the first nine games because of an abdominal muscle strain, from questionable to available 2½ hours before tipoff.
“I’m gonna be ready,” Kleber told reporters after Saturday morning’s shootaround. “Just be prepared and be back out with the guys, get back in rhythm and routine.”
Kleber said he suffered the injury during a drive to the basket in practice during the preseason.
“Very unfortunate, unlucky,” he said. “But we try to best to maintain conditioning and everything else. Try to come back as fast as possible.”
Kleber, 33, was sidelined for most of the preseason because of a “minor” quadriceps injury that he sustained during the Lakers’ first practice of training camp Sept. 30.
The 6-foot-10 German big man, whom the Lakers acquired as part of the trade for Luka Doncic last February, was sidelined for three months to close out last season because of a fractured right foot suffered Jan. 25 while playing for the Dallas Mavericks.
He didn’t play for the Lakers until Game 5 of the team’s first-round playoff series defeat to the Minnesota Timberwolves.
His lone game time during the preseason came in the finale against the Sacramento Kings on Oct. 17, scoring three points, grabbing three rebounds and committing four fouls in 10 minutes off the bench.
Kleber acknowledged his conditioning isn’t up to game speed after all of the missed time.
“It’s tough, man,” Kleber said about his injury misfortunes. “You sometimes don’t always get rewarded. I feel like I did put in the work, especially when it comes to the physical stuff, to stay healthy. But it is what it is, you gotta just make the best out of it, but continue obviously to build on that and try to like consistently stay out there and not have that happen again.”
More to come on this story.
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