Empoword

Part Three: Research and Argumentation 400 weeks away from hearing his name among the first few called in the NBA Draft after a standout year playing basketball at UCLA. Lonzo has two younger brothers as well, one of whom, LiAngelo, will play at UCLA in the 2017-2018 season, and another, LaMelo, who committed to the same university as his brothers two years ago even though he was just an eighth-grader (Calle). The three Ball children played on the same high school team in Chino Hills, California, setting the world alight in early 2016 with their high-powered, free-flowing offense centered around the brothers. They would jack shots that “traditionalists would argue against” but after winning a national championship, “Chino Hills [had] proved its effectiveness in ways never seen before” (Calle). Since then, as the Balls have started to transition out of the world of children playing basketball and entered into the more adult level of college sports (and, soon, the NBA), the attention has shifted from the boys to their father. His outspokenness and demands for respect and inclusion are making waves across the basketball world, even possibly having lasting effects on athletes in every sport. LaVar is attempting to influence everything around his sons, particularly Lonzo as he goes into the league: he is claiming his son will only play for certain teams and, most controversially, distancing himself and his sons from the major shoe companies in a way that an athlete’s camp rarely does at such an early stage in their professional career. What he is doing is undoubtedly risky, but it has clear upside too. If it works, it could clear a path for future athletes to be successful building and monetizing a brand that is not dependent on the sneaker industry. Even if it does not work, it will provide a rough blueprint upon which others can improve in order to become as big as the major signature athletes without having to depend on the corporations backing them. Attacking the status quo is LaVar’s forte. When he and his family first moved into their home in the Alterra neighborhood in Chino Hills, he received grief from the homeowner’s association for attempting to paint his home white and not sticking with the peach color mandated by the association’s guidelines. Fast-forward to now, and President of the Alterra Homeowner’s Association LaVar Ball lives in a white home, proclaiming, “If Obama can have the White House, Goddamnit Big Baller can have a white house!” (Calle). LaVar’s haughty yet sometimes wildly ambitious statements about his family and esteemed symbols like the president have become a bit of a... thing, too.