LaVar Ball said all along that his son Lonzo was going to be drafted by the Los Angeles Lakers, and he was proven right on Thursday night. Does that mean the Lakers are going all-in on the Big Baller Brand? Robert Horry highly doubts it.
Horry, who played seven seasons in L.A. and won three championships there, expects the Lakers to distance themselves from LaVar Ball and his outspoken personality.
“As an organization, they’re probably going to tell him, ‘Bye,’” Horry told Bill Plaschke of the Los Angeles Times. “It was all cool and good before it became a business. The Lakers are one of the biggest brands in sports and they don’t need all this other stuff going on.”
After the Lakers drafted Lonzo with the second overall pick, LaVar did not quiet down. Instead, he immediately guaranteed that his son will lead the team to the playoffs in his rookie season. Horry feels it’s time for the elder Ball to take a break from all that talk for a while.
“I think his Dad is at a point now, he needs to forget about Lonzo and start pumping up his other two sons,” Horry said. “He did exactly what he wanted to do, he got his son all this notoriety, shoes, all these things, how many times does the No. 2 pick get more TV time than the No. 1 pick? But now for his son, it’s about the Lakers, and it’s all different.”
Lonzo himself does not seem flashy at all, but he has a target on his back because of his father’s cockiness. For evidence of that, look no further than the tweet Joel Embiid sent during the draft.
Regardless of how Horry or anyone else feels about LaVar’s antics, they’re not going to stop any time soon. That’s what the Big Baller Brand is all about.
