LaVar Ball Fires Back at LeBron James and His Angry Comments

A war of words between Cleveland Cavaliers forward LeBron James and LaVar Ball, the father of three standout basketball players, has developed over the last 10 days, focusing on each other’s sons. In the most recent volley, Ball has responded to James’ comments from Tuesday which demanded that the latter’s children and family be kept out of any future comments.

Ball appeared on a Fox Sports radio program Tuesday and was specifically asked about comments from James earlier in the day that were in response to Ball’s previous comparisons to the sons of James and former NBA players Dell Curry and Joe Bryant.

“I have no problem with LeBron, they asked me a question about if I thought superstar players’ kids were good. My opinion is I’ve never seen one that’s been really good. LeBron is going to make his kids one of the best players ever according to him,” Ball said. “I’ve never seen one really live up to what their dad has done, so he could be the first. It’s not about me having his kids name in my mouth, I’m not worried about his family. If somebody asks me a question I’ll answer it the way I want to answer it.”

Ball’s previous comments that also included boasts about how he would have handled Michael Jordan in a game of one-on-one resulted in the hosts asking him if people had asked him to tone down or stop making such remarks.

“People are just asking me questions. I’ve been talking all my life, and now the cameras are in front of me… if you want to ask me a question I’m going to give you an answer because I have freedom of speech to say whatever I want. It’s just for conversation the next day,” Ball said. “I don’t care, they not going to stop me from doing what I’m doing. If they get a little touchy about it, who cares. They’re not gonna do nothing to me and I’m not gonna do nothing to them, it’s not a big deal.”

Due to the fact that one of Ball’s sons, Lonzo, is already projected to be a top-five pick in June’s draft, and two other sons are also considered to already be quality players, Ball has lofty expectations on how much money he expects for endorsements.

“It ain’t going to be nothing less than a billion. A lot of folks don’t know what they’re worth, that’s why they only take $250 million,” Ball said. “We’re going to get a billion dollars, guaranteed. They don’t like to hear co-branded, they like to hear endorsement deal.”

It remains to be seen whether or not James responds to these latest comments, with the Cavaliers having 13 games remaining on their regular season schedule and what they hope will be another long playoff run.