Just who IS this guy, LaVar Ball? We know that he is the father of three basketball-playing sons in the Los Angeles area. The oldest, Lonzo, just became the second overall player selected in the 2017 NBA draft by the Los Angeles Lakers last week after playing only one year at UCLA.
Prior to the NBA draft, though, Daddy LaVar Ball took to the talk show circuits over the past several months ago and insisted that his son was so good that he wouldn’t even work out for any team other than the Los Angeles Lakers! And, sure enough, the Lakers took Lonzo with the #2 overall pick. Was LaVar just that smart or lucky or both?
While his son, Lonzo, was a talented freshman point guard at UCLA, Poppa LaVar Ball inserted himself into the national media spotlight as a loud-mouthed braggart who seems intent on hogging the spotlight from his own sons. With two more basketBALLers coming along in the next few years, that is a nauseating thought.
Ol’ Pops has bragged that he could have beaten Michael Jordan 1-on-1 (incredibly doubtful), that his son Lonzo was a better basketball player than recent NBA MVP Stephen Curry (highly doubtful), and that a recently-created basketball shoe line (ironically named “BigBallerBrand” featuring $495/pair sneakers) would soon be worth $1 billion (only time will tell, but don’t bet on it).
Daddy LaVar Ball was a good enough athlete to play both quarterback on the football team and a forward on his high school basketball team. Though initially a junior-college basketball player, he later transferred and played one season at Washington State University – averaging 2 points and 2 rebounds/game. While in college, he met his wife, Tina. Tina also played some college basketball and is currently the athletics director for a local high school.
Other than Dear Ol’ Daddy Ball organizing an AAU basketball team in 2013 named the “BigBallers” to (surprise!) promote his three sons’ careers, I have been unable to find much information about what Mr. Ball has ever done for a living other than live through his own children. To each his own.
But then came Monday Night RAW! The cable television production of World Wrestling Entertainment was in Los Angeles for their weekly show, and, wouldn’t you know it, featured an interview segment between BigDaddy LaVar Ball (along with two of his sons) and an equally loud-mouthed wrestler named “The Miz”. The match-up between the two braggarts finally gave Mr. Ball the proper element for his obnoxious shtick.
Hey, Lonzo. Your Dad has called you a magician with the ball, right? So, why don’t you prove it to us and make a deal to PAY the WWE to take PapaBall on tour for the next few years and leave you (and the rest of us) alone? If you can pull-off that magic feat, then I might (perhaps) consider becoming a Lakers fan!