The superstar suffered a sprain in his side's loss to New Orleans on March 27 and missed four of the next five games.
His absence was a deal breaker for LA, which failed to stay in the play-off zone, with San Antonio taking 10th place.
Package Thursday night for the trip to Golden State, where the Lakers conceded an 8th loss in a row, he will not play against Oklahoma City this Friday night or in Denver on Sunday for the close of the regular season.
If the collective challenge of the play-offs ended up vanishing, giving way to immense disillusion, James could once again make history personally, through another means.
A week ago, his 38 points scored in another defeat against the Pelicans, had allowed him to return to the top of the ranking of the best scorers in the League, ahead of Giannis Antetokounmpo (Milwaukee) and Joel Embiid (Philadelphia), with which he has been neck and neck in recent weeks.
The latter has since regained the lead and seems on track to keep it with 30.4 points on average, ahead of James (30.3 pts) and the Bucks star (29.9 pts).
But to stay in the race, "LBJ" should have participated in the last two meetings of the Lakers, because to be eligible for this honorary title, a player must have played at least 58 matches out of the 82 on the program.
In the end, he only played 56.
As a result, 37-year-old James will not be the oldest regular season scorer in history, a record still owned by Michael Jordan, who was 35 when he finished the 1997-98 season with 28. .7 points on average.
© 2022 AFP