Everbody needs to take it easy on LaMelo Ball

Prodigies can be found in the strangest of places sometimes. For Lamelo Ball, the youngest of the coveted Ball brothers, he was found under the spotlight early on thanks to an older brother and soon to be lottery pick Lonzo Ball as well as his loud-mouthed father Lavar Ball.

The 15-year-old high school star has already been committed to UCLA since he was 13 and has shown great potential with a 92 point game as a sophomore shown here:

This game has received some criticism for the absurd amount of cherry picking which many will say is not good for the game. With that said, this has to be one of the best cherry-picking performances in basketball history. He did get the win and even had some assists at the same time showcasing his ability to make good passes, which says a lot when you put up 92 points in the same game. Another critique of his game is his lack of defense or as Walt ‘Clyde’ Frazier would call it, Matador defense. Although a major flaw to anyone’s game, half of playing defense is effort and he should eventually learn the importance of it as he gains more experience in the future.

Now after three months, multiple recurring clownish acts by Lavar Ball, and the release of a horrendously overpriced pair of shoes, LaMelo is now back in the news only this time it’s really bad. Over the weekend, LaMelo’s AAU team the Big Ballers(who are also coached by Lavar himself) lost by 50 points in the Compton Magic Memorial Day Tournament and there have been compilation videos of LaMelo’s poor performance filled with air balls, non-existent defense, and poor decision making. Here are the highlights from that game:

After this performance, fans all over social media have decided to scrutinize a 15 year old by saying that he is terrible and will be destroyed once he gets to UCLA all after one game. This is absolutely ridiculous. First and foremost, he is only a sophomore in high school and people are already deciding that he won’t be good in college even though he has two more years to fix the flaws in his game which all can easily be fixed. Second, the team he was playing with was clearly out matched by the athleticism of the other team while playing terrible defense as a team so there honestly wasn’t much of a chance for his team to begin with.

Finally, one of the big reasons this game has coverage in the first place is the video of Lavar Ball scolding his team at halftime of this game. Now in no way is Lavar Ball to be completely blamed for this loss or was wrong in his halftime speech, but Ball has brought a lot of attention to not only his family but himself too.

With certain actions like claiming he can beat Michael Jordan one on one and writing the checks that his sons will have to cash, he has been a negative influence on the image of the Ball brothers even though he does want the best for them. This means that any one of the Ball brothers are open to media slaughter when they slip up or have bad performances like LaMelo did this weekend all because of their connection to the extra publicity caused by Lavar, and he was his son’s coach. This easily makes LaMelo the most followed 15

This easily makes LaMelo the most followed 15-year-old in all of basketball. It’s not fair that one bad game by the kid is getting this much attention and it’s definitely not fair that people are saying his future is limited because of it. Besides his defense and low basketball IQ, LaMelo Ball is still very young and has great potential to take his talents to the next level. It’s all on him now to overcome the obstacles thrown at him.