When the Los Angeles Lakers drafted Lonzo Ball in 2017, he came to the team with a ton of pressure on him, due in large part to his father LaVar Ball constantly being in the media. He also came into the league with his own brand, Big Baller Brand, which included his own signature sneaker.
The shoes came under a lot of scrutiny, however, especially as Ball suffered multiple knee and ankle injuries in those first couple of seasons. And Ball recently revealed that the Lakers themselves forced him to stop wearing the sneakers.
“Bro, I tried to wear them though, I actually wore them for a fair amount of time,” Ball said on a recent episode of the Ball in the Family podcast. “And I wore them longer than I wanted to wear them, but me and my pops had got into it… But it came to a point, really the Lakers made me stop wearing them. Called me into the office and s—, played a video they were like bro look at this s— and it was like my shoe was already turning before I hit the ground type s—. Like, you can’t wear these no more.
“But I was already, like I didn’t wanna wear them in the first place. But I’m always gonna support my pops just because I love him. But yeah, that shoe just wasn’t for me.”
The Lakers making this call is more than reasonable and understandable as they viewed Ball as a major piece of the puzzle with the team looking to rebuild. The Lakers had a ton of promising young talent including Ball, Brandon Ingram, Kyle Kuzma, Julius Randle and Josh Hart, amongst others, and they very much wanted to protect their investment.
Unfortunately for Ball, those injuries would continue even after stopping wearing the Big Baller Brand shoes with him ultimately missing two full seasons and severely damaging his promising career. And many will look at the decision to wear those shoes at the start of his career as one that changed the course of everything.
Lakers hire Rohan Ramadas as assistant GM of strategy and data systems
Building out the front office staff is a top priority for the Lakers this offseason and the team is already making big moves. Rob Pelinka has said the team will hire two assistant general managers and the first has already been found in Rohan Ramadas, who will be in charge of strategy and data systems.
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