Lakers guard Lonzo Ball has a torn meniscus in his left knee, Shams Charania of Yahoo Sports tweets. Ball is expected to be ready for training camp, Charania adds.
Ball’s injury thickens the plot as the club attempts to sign or acquire superstar talents. LeBron James had decided to opt out of his contract and the Lakers are the favorite to land him. They’re also engaged in talks with the Spurs to acquire Kawhi Leonard. Though it doesn’t appear Ball is part of those trade discussions, the injury increases the chances he’ll stay put.
Ball dealt with left knee issues at various points of his rookie season. A sprained left medial collateral ligament and a left knee bruise limited the point guard to 52 games. Ball was a triple-double threat every time he took the court, averaging 10.2 PPG, 6.9 RPG and 7.2 APG but shot a woeful 36% from the field.
what a horrible pick at #2 by the Lakers. His body is breaking down and he is barely 20. And I doubt his heart is really in the game. he’s playing because his Dad pushed him; most other players play because they need the money or have a passion for the game.
Trade him before he loses all his trade value.
Wow. A lot of leaps there.
1- An injury doesn’t mean his body is breaking down. Westbrook tore his meniscus a few years ago. Is his body breaking down, too?
2- His dad is a jacka$$. What does that have to do with his love of basketball? Tiger Woods was pushed by his dad. He must not love golf. Serena and Venus Williams were pushed by their dad, too. They must loathe tennis. And second-generation stars like Curry and Thompson, forget about them. They were pushed too hard to properly love what they’re doing.
The athletes you mention play individual sports and has massive early success. Ball hasn’t. Ball has had more than one injury and has missed a shocking number of games. He doesn’t play with passion. His rap career dissed a teammate and hurt team chemistry. He would have been a decent late round pick for a club that had time to develop him. The Lakers really blew the pick.
Complete overreaction and just ignorant comment that shouldn’t be given any weight.
Bart you come across as a hater. Please educate yourself before leaving comments here.
27th Kuzma>2nd ball. You tell him to educate himself but you can’t say you’d rather have ball than Kuzma, therefore Bart is educated
Truth hurts
Right back at you. None of you have shown that anything I have said is wrong.
You haven’t shown that anything you said is correct. It works in that direction, not in the way of you making wild claims and people having to disprove it. You prove your point first then people can disprove it, you haven’t shown the capability to make a sound argument in the first place.
FTR…20 year old Ball had 4 different injuries that caused him to miss games. One I. training camp, a December shoulder injury and 2 knee injuries. Now a third. He is either very brittle or soft.
Almost averaged a triple double in rookie season. Its cool, dont think many in the industry care what you keyboard warrior think. Just because hes had injuries doesnt make him a bad or injury prone player. Nothing points to this dude still played 52 games at 20 years old. Chill.
LOL you are the crowd the media aims for
I don’t know, I think Bart is onto something. Those Dads may have pushed their children but they didn’t exploit them as Lavar Ball has. Psychologically Lonzo May be broken beyond repair. Lavar is the sports equivalent of Trump.
When you wake up tomorrow hung over I hope you’re ashamed of what you commented
I highly doubt they will get Leonard or Lebron , sure the lakers have a lot of money to throw at whomever they want but so did the Knicks a year or two ago .. and we all know how well that worked out for them ..
Spurs will not take him because of the circus. Rumor has it Lebron & Co. prefer he is not part of the team. Lebron is not going to want to listen to Daddy cakes loud mouth noise. Who would?
Now nobody will want him in a trade
Other than LA who wanted him before?
He’s not going anywhere before the injury or after the injury. He’s the perfect point guard for a star studded team. Just like Rondo with the Celtics when they won it all in 08. Pass first, move the ball, don’t shoot too much, play defense.
So Bart tell us how you really feel.
it’s fake. it was a ploy by his father just so he don’t get traded.
I was going to say the same thing. He’s going to get traded or released and end up in that league his dad plans on opening up.
I think it’s a stretch to say his “body is breaking down”. Basketball players are by nature prone to have leg related problems and a torn meniscus isn’t necessarily a degenerative condition. Also, I seriously doubt he’s playing basketball simply cause his father wants him to. I’m sure all 3 sons have a passion for the game. Maybe the middle son is feeling something because he knows he’s not NBA material but even him, I’m sure, wants to play somewhere.
Probably leaked by Ball camp strategically in hopes that he doesn’t get traded
I think most NBA teams would look past his FG % for another year since rookie shooting numbers are almost always an outlier to the downside. His Dad is another matter. Magic had no doubts in drafting him (although maybe there was a kinship there as Magic couldn’t shoot for the first part of his career, albeit in a different league).
Lonzo is a duel threat, staying healthy is huge but his ability to create shots and make them needs to be a priority this offseason
Not with LeBron. He’ll never see the ball.
Good thing he isnt that athletic anyway.
This. Lol
I think we need to keep an eye on LaVar. Since he didn’t get drafted, he will probably strip LiAngelo for parts in order to rebuild Lonzo.
You win the interwebs.
Ugliest shot in NBA history. Trash teammate. Overrated player. Locker room headache. Trade him overseas
Yea it could be a ploy to prevent a trade. Same thing at the trade deadline, injury popped up.
How much hate some people have for Ball, cannot understand the guy is an absolute beast of a player, & I can say that based on the last season I do prefer Ball to Kuzma, for me Ball together with Mitchell as the best rookies (apart of Simmons of course) so 1st all-rookie team, Kuzma 2nd rookie team, so no way near the performance of Ball, by the way Ball shoots the same % of Smart, after Smart has had 4 years to improve, which means Ball is probably gonna shoot better, & his game is better all around, great defender, better passer & vision, better rebounding… I really get annoyed by all this hate for the kid, hate his dad but he hasn’t done anything wrong & his numbers as a rookie where absolutely unbelievable man, he will be a star in this league make no mistake about it.
Pointing out the facts about Zo is not hate. Playing 50 games due to constant injury could very well be an indication of more injury in the future. His shot mechanics are terrible and no thought of changing them is bad news. His diet is notoriously horrible. Pancakes & sausage with a pile of grated cheese with get you hurt. I see him get beat on defense constantly. Drafting on potential is something for the second round not second overall. Zo is just a coin flip from first overall Danny Ainge robbed Sixers & faked Magic into picking Zo.
Spurs will not take him because of the circus. Rumor has it Lebron & Co. prefer he is not part of the team. Lebron is not going to want to listen to Daddy cakes loud mouth noise. Who would?
I’m having doubts about Lonzo. And I think the best Laker is Josh Hart, even though apparently Pops isn’t looking that way in trade talks. He is kind of DannyGreen-like.
It doesn’t help that both Sixers and Lakers passed on Jayson Tatum and that Donovan Mitchell blew up. The microscope was already huge for Fultz and Ball that they are getting held to such a high standard. Except one lost his marbles and the other has injuries/diva daddy. Don’t forget the transformation Ball has done during the off-season putting on all that muscle. His body needs to get used to it. How does all that muscle make his shot better though? Who knows. Not a laker fan, but I think Ball isn’t a bust yet. Let the kids play.