It’s not exactly a surprise that things have been a bit uncomfortable with LaVar Ball and the Los Angeles Lakers. The Big Baller Brand patriarch’s son, rookie Lonzo Ball, is the tie that binds these entities together, and the point guard has had his ups and downs in his first season.
Both Ball and the Lakers have a lot riding on Lonzo’s success, which has come in spurts this season. The team has actually improved since he went down with an injury, with the young team coming together in his absence to play good defensive basketball and find its chemistry on offense.
LaVar has been critical of Lakers coach Luke Walton this season, which has led to a lot of public talk about his job security and how the Lakers have handled Ball’s vocal criticism. But team president Magic Johnson says he understands both LaVar and Lonzo and the situation they’re in.
Johnson talked to ESPN’s Ramona Shelbourne for a story that was published Thursday and described the “special relationship” he has with Lonzo Ball’s father.
“I got a special relationship with LaVar,” Johnson told ESPN. “I think he understands … I just want the best for him. For his son. I told him, ‘I’ve been down this road that your son is about to go down, so you got the best person sitting here. So what I need you to do is just worry about the business side. Let me take care of the basketball side.'”
The story explains the Lakers’ initial stance on Ball: Let him talk and sell shoes and do whatever he thinks is necessary. The team won’t say anything about it one way or the other.
The tipping point came when Ball was unable to get messages to higher-ups in the Lakers organization, which is apparently when Ball decided to publicly criticize the coach. And according to Shelbourne, people had even started to call the Lakers with complaints about Big Baller Brand orders asking for help.
The team needed, in essence, to create a better divide between the Big Baller Brand and the Lakers. It started with talking to Ball directly to tone it down, though they didn’t want to respond to the public.
According to sources close to the situation, Johnson called an associate of LaVar’s and strongly admonished him. Publicly, though, the Lakers said nothing.
“Look, we had lost nine in a row and you didn’t hear nothing from me, right? I was supporting Luke through all nine in a row,” Johnson says. “So now, LaVar comes out and says something, and everybody asks, ‘Why didn’t you say nothing?’
“I’m not gonna respond to people saying different things. [Walton] already had my vote of confidence. There’s never been a question about his job security here. But everybody else was trying to make a big deal out of it. I was good with Luke, I was good with Jeanie. So I said we should do nothing because if we react to this, now anytime somebody says something about the Lakers, we gotta react.
With the Lakers playing better ball as of late, things are much calmer than they were earlier in the season. The team has publicly supported Walton, and there’s hope Ball continues to improve. But there’s also always a chance things blow up and LaVar starts riling people up again. It’s a fluid situation, as they say, but any situation involving LaVar Ball can get loud and messy in a hurry.
