I had an infection on my foot that started spreading through my blood due to not paying attention to my diabetes. I ended up having to get my leg amputated. First, they cut off a couple of toes. Then they cut off my foot. Then they said, We gotta go almost knee high for another surgery. Three surgeries. And then there were also the blood transfusions. Not one, not two, not three, four different times.

All those surgeries and blood transfusions, it made me question whether it was worth going through it sometimes. It made me think, Man, just kill me and let me go about my business. It made me think that maybe it’s time for me to shut it down.

But then seeing what my boys are doing out there, they’re like, Dad you’re the toughest dude I know. That made me keep going. Even though I’m a bad man—I don’t need much—it was good to have that backing from my boys. One of the things that makes me go is when they are all together. When they are all together, I feel strong.

When I was in the hospital and “Tweaker” was starting to become a global hit, I had a couple of FaceTime conversations with Gelo, but I was kind of slurring because I was all drugged up with all the medication they were putting in me. It was hard for me to really dial in on what I was trying to say. Even though I was kind of slurring with my speech, Gelo understood what I was trying to say. I remember just telling him, Keep doing your thing. And make sure you take care of your brothers. Just make sure all of y’all are together. Cause the more you guys are together, the better I feel. That’s all I kept thinking about when I was in the hospital—my boys being together. 

What I want people to understand is that anytime you’re dealing with an illness or something serious like that, one thing you better have is family to get you through that stuff.

I’m the Big Baller. I’m hard to kill. But I must admit that my boys kept me rolling. Cause a couple of times, I was like, I can’t do no more blood transfusions. I can’t do no more operations. I’m just ready to shut it down. It’s enough for me. But I’m here for a bigger purpose.

Watching my boys play and watching Gelo perform and do his thing—he’s been singing and rapping all his life, so it’s good to see the success that he’s having now—that made me feel better. So, then I was like, Let me go ahead and just do these other surgeries and blood transfusions.

From my experience the last couple months, I want to get in people’s heads the importance of taking care of your health—especially Black people, because sometimes we’re not trying to go to the hospital, we will try to sleep it off or say, Yeah, we’ll get to it later. And sometimes it’s a little more serious than what you think.

I look at my situation like this: I’ve talked to some of my people that’s my age that’s been calling me that have cancer. And they say, We thought we got it all, but we didn’t, and so the organs are getting tore up in the inside. Now these folks are dying. And these are my friends that are around my age, in the 50s and dying of cancer. Just for me to have my foot cut off, I got another one. I’m good to have my foot cut off as opposed to being dead. But if I don’t go at the end of last year during Christmas to get that infection looked at, [an infection] that’s been around for maybe a month or two on the bottom of my foot, this would be a different type of story. 

The doctors said, Big Baller, you were very close to having to shut it down. But they were quick enough to give me the blood transfusions and keep that poison from going throughout my body. So, now I’m telling folks, if you got diabetes, don’t just be like, Oh, that’s just diabetes. I still eat my sugar, but I pay attention to it and do it in moderation. Get your checkups, do what you’re supposed to do. If you don’t have insurance, go to urgent care. Because I’m going to tell you this, a little amputation and a little of this, it could all have been prevented.

I realized through this process that if you stop trying to waste time feeling sorry for yourself and figure out what the next step is, then you’d be able to better deal with any life challenge. I look at it like this, OK, my foot is gone, but my brain is still here. So, I might not be able to move as fast as I did and do other things like that, but what’s the next step? Do I keep talking about the brand? Still keep talking about shoes? Still go out to meet people?

It makes me feel way better in looking at the outcome to go forward because I still want to be on this journey. And I look at it like this, too: I got a lot of limbs to come off. I’m hard to kill. I got some bigger stuff that the Big Baller still gotta do. And that guy upstairs put me here for a reason. And I’m gonna get it done.

As long as I can smile and see my boys, I’m good. But this whole experience made me realize, [you’re] lucky that you have family to get you through some stuff. But don’t feel sorry for me. You could be missing something, too. You better be careful. But that’s how you gotta respond to that. I still got folks around me that work hard and understand my drive to build a brand, to make shoes and to make other folks have the confidence in what they’re doing. 

Please understand that being successful is in your own mind. It’s not how much money you make. You could be successful if you can stay on your own two feet and got your own money coming in. Or if you come from a different situation that’s a little more dire and you come out of that? That’s success for you. Success doesn’t have to be, Does he have a Rolex? 

I noticed one of the photos SLAM took during this cover shoot. And most of the young guys, they’re not going to get this. Gelo had diamonds on his neck, diamonds on his wrist. Pull up with a diamond chain. This is usually how people show that they got it. Especially young people. They point to the jewelry. But I point to the Triple Bs on my chest. This brand, it’s worth more than your diamonds on your neck. To me, a brand is one of the biggest things you can own. So, I don’t wear any watches and chains. I don’t need to. For me, it’s all about Triple B’s, the brand.

To all the loyal fans, those who have stuck with us through thick and thin, I love all y’all. Keep doing your thing, because it ain’t gonna stop me—it ain’t gonna make me go or stop. But only be true to yourself. If you don’t like us, get to the side. If you do like us, roll with us. It’s all good. But I’m gonna keep smiling and grinning while I’m going, until the day Big Baller shuts it down. But I tell you what, when I do shut it down, you’re gonna remember who I was. I ain’t gonna change nobody, but I’m gonna change this culture. Ownership is everything.

I was telling Gelo over the phone the other day, I always said you was going to be a monster with whatever you did—whether it be basketball, rapping, singing! It’s all the same—it’s entertainment. And my boys can entertain. I also remember the boys feeling so good for Gelo in January. Anything that’s happening that’s good for Gelo, it’s good for them.

The fact that they are all together as a unit, it made me feel great. Everybody’s always saying now, Oh, LaVar went three for three. No—I’ve been three for three since the moment they came out the womb. So, I’m not going to wait until now to say, Finally! I was two for three, but now I’m three for three. I’ve always been three for three! I got three of the coldest monsters in the world. That’s what I’ve told everybody for years. But they used to call me crazy. But my boys are really like that, as the kids say. No matter what they’re doing, they’re going to be successful at it. As long as I’m seeing my boys smiling and doing what they do, then nothing else matters. 

Everybody wants to comment on us now. So, you got people now being, like, LaVar is father of the year—greatest father of all time. There are a lot of people that could be father of the year, but you want to put me on the pedestal because I got the platform now. What other sons are doing all of this right now? I mean, before you had me on another pedestal—Oh, LaVar is crazy like Ja Morant’s dad and all these other folks’ dads, they said. 

Now they changed the narrative—Oh shoot, Gelo is successful. Oh, well, LaVar’s good now. Yeah, because everybody’s worried about that money. That money changes a lot of folks. People that I haven’t heard from in a long time now want to reach out to me. 

With Gelo, whether you like him or don’t like him, it’s fine with us. It doesn’t stop us from doing what we’re doing. See, a lot of people be, like, Oh, Gelo just got his so-called newfound fame. No, he was famous when he came out the womb. Whether it be basketball or singing or rapping, he’s always been good. So, I’m not going to feel a different way about it now and be like, Oh, I’m so happy for Gelo. I’ve been happy for Gelo since he been my son. This is nothing new for me, it was a matter of time. 

The marketability of Gelo is on a whole different level. And I know the people that’s backing him, they see that. That boy got a look, got a sound. He got something you can count on that [can] go further in the business, as far as endorsements and all things that come with this entertainment.

To me, fatherhood, at the end of the day, as a parent, you just want to make sure that when you leave this earth, your kids are well taken care of. Whether you give them some money, or you give them a trade where they can take care of themselves. There’s a lot of people trying to be fathers, but at least from what I do on this platform, is to show people, Hey, stick around for your kids, regardless of what goes on with that woman. Stick around for your kids and do the best you can for something that you brought into this world. If your kid ain’t gonna be 6-5 or 6-8, you better put them in an education. If they’re going to be big, stay with them. If they’re going to be in sports, get them the right way. Fatherhood to me is something that’s mine, and I’m going to care about it ’til I die. And seeing all my boys’ success is what keeps me going. 

I just hate that they put all the numbers of what the boys are making in the paper. Everybody now is like, Gelo made it! What’s $13 million compared to what Lonzo made? $80-something million. And what’s $80-something million compared to what Melo is making? $200-something million. Then they wanna add it all up and be like, They made it—they don’t have to do nothing else in life!

So, we’re just going to sit around with a bunch of money and don’t do nothing impactful and help people with it? At the end of the day, you have to help somebody do something. Whether it be one person, two people, 10 people, a thousand people—you have to help somebody do something. That’s the bottom line. Because after you done bought everything—what’s really left?

The post LaVar Ball Talks Near-Death Health Scare in First Interview Since Amputation appeared first on SLAM.

Our family’s movement is about letting other parents and prospects know, “Hey, you don’t have to feel pressured into thinking that there aren’t many options. There’s a different route that you can take in this.”

All we want to do is plant the seed and watch it grow. Show people that it can be done. Show parents that it’s possible: We don’t need the big companies. They need us. And so we should work together.

Big Baller Brand wants to show the next generation that there’s a difference between building wealth and just being rich. This isn’t about getting that early money—just another athlete signing a regular endorsement deal. That would have been the easier route. But we’ve embarked on a mission. We want to go beyond just inspiring athletes. It’s about those small business owners that stay up at night plotting their next move and figuring out how to stay afloat.

We know of the impact that this is having on the industry because we’ve already witnessed a larger conversation rise as a result of Lonzo announcing his ZO2 signature shoe. The dialogue that it has started is a step in the right direction. It shows that we’ve already made progress.

One of the most important things that a parent can do for their kid is to stay involved. In the sports world, many parents have let so many people into their kids’ inner circle that there are meetings happening and yet they’re not even invited to any of them. Your son is the endorser but gets no say in it—yet he’s doing all the work. As parents, we have to understand our value, and the value of our children.

When Zo was a freshman in high school, my wife Tina and I were looking at how these endorsement deals work and we said, “We gotta do our own thing.” We had already been doing our thing with the Big Ballers AAU program. As time went on, we just kept the plan on the back burner until it was time—which was when Zo, LiAngelo and LaMelo were on the same team at the same time. That was the magical season we had in 2015-16, when Chino Hills HS went 35-0.

In April of 2016 our conversations turned into action. We said, “We gotta do something on our own, to represent this brand by ourselves.” By the end of the month, we had our first batch of Big Baller Brand merchandise, all stacked up on the pool table at the house. Then it just grew bigger and bigger. Now we’re stacking them up at the factory.

This movement isn’t about throwing away a bunch of money. When I said, “You’re not a big baller if you don’t buy these shoes,” it was about dedication, discipline and following your goals to earn enough to purchase something you want to own. Not just a dream, but a goal—you can dream all day, but when you have goals, you have a timeline.

When something new comes up, you’re going to get some other people to try it. Some will be successful and some won’t. All I want is for everybody who thinks about doing something similar to what our family is doing to at least have faith in it. Blockbuster used to be the thing every weekend, but then came Netflix. You gotta change with the times. And once the athletes say, “Hey, you know what? I don’t have to do it this way. I am the brand,” then that’s when the game changes.

Let’s say the top five picks in each of the next five drafts say they don’t want an endorsement deal. Or, if they do decide they want to sign an endorsement deal, they immediately ask, “Where’s my signature shoe? Can I get it by next month?” Then what?

I hope prospects and their parents start to visualize this. If you don’t invest in your own, who will?

Ten years from now, people will look back and understand what I was saying.

There’s a difference between being famous, rich and wealthy. Anybody can become famous and get rich. But can you stay rich? That’s the hard part and that’s where wealth comes in.

I’m proud of how my boys have handled it all. Earlier this year the mother of one of Melo’s friends took him to the same mall they’ve been going to since they were kids. Melo walked in and word got out that he was there. Next thing you know, kids are rushing toward him and security was like, “We can’t have this.” They had to step in, back everyone away and Melo had to be escorted out the side of the mall. And that’s when we saw that this movement is going to a whole different level.

The countless hours that Zo, Gelo and Melo have put in to get to this point—no one can ever take that away from them. They’ve invested so much time and effort into their craft. Zo turned the UCLA program around this year, Gelo led the state of California in scoring, and Melo is now under a microscope in ways that no other high school player has ever been before.

Our family has put a lot of work into this movement. We’re happy with the quality of the ZO2s. I would never put my own son in a shoe that’s going to put him at risk of getting hurt.

We just want to inspire people and show them that there’s a different lane you can travel in. It’s OK to step out and do it another way. Only a select few will do it, but folks will start creating their own brands, like we’ve done with BBB, and more and more families will begin feeling comfortable with betting on themselves.

You just gotta have the vision. Without the vision, you have no precision.

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Portraits by Atiba Jefferson

The post Whole New Ball Game appeared first on SLAM.