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Big Baller Brand has had one of the worst weeks for a sports company in a long time, and this comes in the midst of the accusations attorney Michael Avenatti made against Nike saying that it paid star players Deandre Ayton and Bol Bol while they were still amateur athletes. If that’s not a sign of how bad things have been for Big Baller Brand, what is?
But even with all the rumors about the company’s future, co-founder Lavar Ball isn’t backing down from keeping the dream alive of BBB, saying he has no plans to shut things down following all the turmoil that’s happened in the past week alone.
Speaking with 98.5 KLUC, via TMZ Sports, Lavar said that, while his fellow co-founder and family friend Alan Foster is being accused of stealing $1.5 million from Ball’s son Lonzo — which prompted the Lakers point guard to delete all association with the brand on social media and encourage his brothers, LiAngeleo and LaMelo, to do the same — the brand is planning on overcoming this and moving forward. Here’s what Lavar Ball had to say about the company’s future.
“I’m not gonna let one roodypoo guy come in here and do something bad and then be like, ‘Oh, the brand’s not good.’ The brand is good. It’s just somebody did something bad to it … We had a snake up in the thing, but you gotta understand this—I’m a snake charmer. When you’re a snake charmer, you’re gonna get bit.”
This is an ambitious stance by Lavar Ball on Big Baller Brand, mainly because, well, let’s face it, without his sons as part of the company, especially Lonzo, who does he really have to promote the business? Sure, the Big Baller Brand High School All-American Game is still scheduled to happen as Lavar planned after LaMelo’s snub from other star-studded All-Star games, but is that really enough publicity to make the brand relevant long-term? It’s doubtful.
With Lonzo Ball recently hinting at joining Nike and having already covering up his Big Baller Brand tattoo, it seems like he’s out on trying to make the company work again. And while Lavar Ball has to get some credit for trying to fight for a brand he founded and received a ton of attention for, it might be time to just call it quits at this point and avoid any additional embarrassment.
Charles Barkley may have said it best recently when he had this to say about the potential failure of Big Baller Brand, specifically calling out Lavar Ball in the process.
“[Lonzo] should have been his own man from the beginning. You can’t let your family members try to piggyback on your success. This is his time. He’s a nice kid, he’s a good player. I’d like to see him healthy. But this thing has been a disaster from Day 1.
It was never going to work, and I feel bad, because this ol’ big mouth, jackass dad has put his kid in an awkward situation all year. Like I said, I don’t want to see anything bad happen to the kid, but I don’t like his dad at all, and this thing has been a joke from the beginning.”
If that’s how most people in sports feel about Big Baller Brand, Lavar Ball should swallow his pride, cut his losses and move on.