“Is LaVar Ball hurting Lonzo’s draft stock?”
This has been a question for the better part of five months as the UCLA star and presumptive top-3 pick’s father became increasingly vocal about his son’s basketball prowess (as well as his own) and became a staple of the midday sports talk show circuit. LaVar Ball says lots of things, most of which are ridiculous. He compares his son and himself to Michael Jordan. He talks about UCLA having too many white guys to win, and he sells his son’s shoe for almost $500.
Despite all of those antics, the answer to that question has been “not really,” no matter how many times its asked to any number of unnamed executives around the NBA. The latest instance of this comes from this week’s NBA Combine, where both Balls are absent as they, along with many other top prospects, pass on the poking and prodding and testing of the combine that can only really hurt their stock at this point. Marc Berman of The New York Post decided to ask around with the question we’ve already seen answered and got, unsurprisingly, most of the same answers.
The general consensus from the “dozen” scouts, GMs, and personnel executives that Berman spoke with was that Ball can play, it really doesn’t matter if his dad talks a lot and says some outlandish things, and that he’s most likely not going to slide past No. 2. Alright, so why do we keep talking about this? Because you can get anonymous scouts or executives that have no chance of getting Ball to say things like this.
“Talking to people here, some guys are straying away from him as a top pick,’’ said one Western Conference scout whose team is not in Tuesday’s lottery. “If you don’t play him the right way, is the father going to say something? And you don’t want to have him on a big stage like New York. You’re always thinking: What’s next?’’
One Eastern Conference executive, also not in Tuesday’s lottery, said the team that drafts Ball would be wise to meet with father and son before training camp.
“I don’t think he falls past 2, but it’s a concern in the back of everyone’s mind,’’ the executive told The Post. “The team will have to sit down with Lonzo and LaVar to set the groundwork. It will be interesting.”
Good, glad we’ve talked to two people from teams that won’t be anywhere close to drafting Lonzo to get their thoughts on what possible distraction he could be. Look, I get it. You talk to the people you can that have been through drafts and know what the decision making process is and the debates with drafting guys that may come with outside distractions. However, when the consensus says he’s not getting past No. 2, I think we can stop worrying about whether it’s LaVar’s fault he’s not going to go No. 1 rather than No. 2.
Markelle Fultz has been at the top of most mock drafts for a good while now, and not because LaVar started talking. Any team that drafts Lonzo is going to have had him into their facility, met with him and his representation — which, guess what, includes LaVar — and will have thoroughly vetted him. Saying a team “will have to sit down” with them is true, but also stating the obvious. LaVar Ball isn’t tanking his draft stock with anything he says. One of Berman’s sources even makes the point that the only issue LaVar is causing for Lonzo is potentially hurting his personal brand off the court.
“People are looking at the talents,’’ the GM [in the lottery] said, “and the character of the individual. There are sometimes outside influences that you concern yourself with. But in this case, it doesn’t seem to be disruptive to anyone but his own brand value.”
LaVar Ball might keep Lonzo from succeeding on the sneaker market, but if Lonzo doesn’t go No. 1 in June it won’t be because the top team is “scared” of LaVar, but that Fultz is seen as the slightly better prospect in the eyes of many.
