Pistons Scam LiAngelo Ball: How fans were fooled into thinking Lavar had “spoken it into existence”
“I’m going to speak it into existence.” These are the words that Lavar Ball, Big Baller Brand founder and flamboyant father of the “Ball Brothers,” said in regards to how he believed his three sons—LaMelo, LiAngelo, and Lonzo—would all play on the same team in the NBA. Last month, Lavar Ball seemed to have made significant progress in accomplishing this goal after the Charlotte Hornets drafted LaMelo with the 3rd overall pick, and the Detroit Pistons signed LiAngelo to its preseason roster. Fans believed that all the brothers had finally made the NBA; Lavar’s words were becoming a reality. However, weeks later, on December 14, the Detroit Pistons waived LiAngelo after he failed to play in either of the team’s first two preseason games. Fans of the Ball Brothers were both surprised and frustrated, believing that the Pistons had not given LiAngelo a fair chance. In reality, the Pistons signing LiAngelo Ball—a player who clearly was never ready for the NBA—was a façade, a publicity stunt to gain attention for the worst team in the league.
LiAngelo has not had a conventional career for a prospective NBA player. In college, he played basketball at UCLA—for about three weeks. In November, after scoring 11 points in a preseason game against Division II team Cal State Los Angeles, LiAngelo was charged with shoplifting from a Louis Vuitton Store in Hangzhou, China before UCLA were to play their (canceled) regular-season opener in Shanghai.
Once he returned to the US, UCLA suspended LiAngelo indefinitely. A month later, he withdrew from the university to play professional basketball for Prenai in the Lithuanian Basketball League (LKL). There, he averaged 12.6 PPG and 2.7 RPG before declaring for the 2018 NBA Draft. Though Lavar called his son “the best two-guard in the draft,” LiAngelo expectedly when undrafted. In 2018, LiAngelo played in the Junior Basketball Association for the Los Angeles Ballers, a league his father founded as an alternative to college basketball for players seeking to go “one-and-done.” A year later, LiAngelo was sidelined for a year after undergoing surgery on his ankle.
In December 2019, LiAngelo signed with the Oklahoma City Blue, a G-league team, as a practice player, and in March, the Blue signed LiAngelo to a contract. However, the guard didn’t appear in a game since the season was cancelled due to the coronavirus pandemic.
On December 2, the Pistons signed LiAngelo—who appeared in one college game against a Division II squad, averaged 13 PPG for the worst team in a mediocre league, and played in his father’s manufactured league—to a non-guaranteed contract. As ESPN pundit Stephen A Smith said on his show First Take, “we don’t even know if [LiAngelo] can play Division I basketball.” Yet, he somehow managed to earn a spot on an NBA preseason roster when players such as Kay Felder, who averaged 24.4 PPG in a college season, can hardly achieve the same feat.
The Ball Family has always been quite popular, even before the sons made the NBA. With a reality show on Facebook, a golden mansion, and a father who claims he could beat Michael Jordan “one-on-one” (Lavar averaged 2.2 PPG in college), the family has often garnered comparisons to the Kardashians. The Ball Family attracts attention. Even though they may lack the skill, the Ball brothers have undeniable star power.
Ultimately, the Pistons, a team destined for a top lottery pick in the 2021 draft, wanted a celebrity to gain TV viewers rather than a potential NBA player. That is the problem with the Ball Brothers: their celebrities first, basketball players second.
