Lakers’ Metta World Peace Prepares for Return to the Floor

Last night the Los Angeles Lakers took one step closer to advancing to the second round of the NBA playoffs to face the Oklahoma City Thunder after taking a 3-1 series lead with a win over the Denver Nuggets at the Pepsi Center.

With this win, the Lakers also cut the seven-game suspension given to Metta World Peace down to just two more games. There’s a good chance that the Lakers will close out the series with the Nuggets in Game 5 in L.A., which would mean that World Peace will miss the first game of the second-round series against the Thunder.

Over the last two games, the loss of World Peace has been felt by the Lakers’ coaching staff as they miss the physical play and energy that the veteran forward brought to the floor on a nightly basis.

As usual, World Peace has been very active off the floor over the course of his suspension. On Saturday night at the team’s hotel in Denver, World Peace paid for his teammates to watch the Miguel Cotto-Floyd Mayweather Jr. fight. The Lakers forward also provided food and drinks for his teammates as a way to show appreciation to the guys he does battle with in an effort to win a 17^th NBA title for the Lakers franchise.

World Peace talked about his teammate’s attitudes towards him since receiving the suspension and the upcoming appearance on “Conan” via Mike Breshanahan of the L.A. Times:

“They’re just normal. Everybody’s a veteran,” he said. “It doesn’t feel like anything (happened).”

He said Sunday he was still “definitely in good shape” and could pick up where he was before the suspension.

“I don’t really think about it much, to tell the truth. Whatever,” he said.

He plans to appear Monday on the “Conan” talk show, making up for a previously scheduled appearance last month.

“I was going on there to do comedy and when I got suspended, it wasn’t time for comedy,” he said. “I’m not going to do comedy (Monday). I’m just going to go on.”

Even though the Lakers have struggled over the past two games against the Nuggets, getting World Peace back after just two more games will definitely help this team’s chances of contending with the likes of the Thunder and paving their way to Western Conference Finals.