I know that we normally try to make jokes here, but sometimes you got to cover a subject that no matter how much I try, I find humor in it, And like I can't find zero humor in this, we got to talk about Lonzo Ball.
This thing is out of control. It is so sad.
First of all, Lonzo is not only a great player, but the Bulls haven't really recovered since he went down last season.
I think they were number one in the East at one point.
But he's also a good dude. He's a really good dude, beloved by his teammates. The Ball brothers are, by every account that I've heard of, totally good guys.
How good was he with the Bulls when the Bulls?
When the Bulls were playing with Lonzo Ball, they were the number one seed in the East. He was shooting forty two from three, and even more important, the Bulls loud eight point six year points per game when compared to when he was off the court, that was top four percent in the entire NBA. Defense never recovered since
he left. So I don't know if that makes the Lonzo Ball injury update more painful to hear, but it's certainly if you're the Bulls doesn't make it any less painful, so they officially the Bulls shut down Lonzo Ball for the season last week.
Yeah, I don't think you're shocked.
I'm not shocked, but it's it's kind of scary considering that we didn't see him play most of last year. Now we haven't seen him play this year, and it's pretty jarring to hear. When the reason came out behind it, it's probably even more difficult to process. So just to recap the timeline, because it's weird and complicated and it
took a while. January fourteenth, Lonzo Ball tore his meniscus, pretty simple, pretty normal injury that we've seen in the NBA under the knife, goes and gets arthroscopic surgery right after, misses the rest of the season, which you could say some people do come back from meniscus tears with surgery, some people don't. Not cause for concern yet, the timeline from being able to play following surgery sometimes can range from four to six months, so okay.
The dark clouds then begin to form.
Eight months later, in September, Lonzo then has a second surgery on the same knee, on the same tear.
The Bulls said it would.
Just be a few months just to clean up, which is obviously a lie, and they were looking at it January twenty twenty three return date. But then January twenty eighth came and Billy Donovan let it slip that Lonzo Ball was nowhere near returning to the court, and in fact, it actually became known that Lonzo Ball was still in pain and wasn't even able to run yet.
Wow. The Bulls released this statement.
Despite making significant increases in strength and function over the past several months, Bulls guard Lonzo Ball continues to experience performance limiting discomfort during participation and high level basketball activities. Considering the time required to achieve the necessary level of fitness to return to play and the current stage of
the NBA season, Ball will not return this season. The focus for him will be to continue to be on the resolution of his discomfort and a full return for the twenty twenty three twenty twenty four season.
So what's wrong?
According to his dad, LaVar Ball, Lonzo has quote debris and a nerve.
What does that mean?
I don't actually know what that means. Is that like when you get dust in your eye? Because that stuff's really painful. Is that like the expanded dust in the eye scenario. The issue apparently is even more complicated because Tristan Thompson went on ESPN and reported that doctors have told Lonzo Ball that this is a unique injury that they have never seen before. So it was not just a meniscus tear. So when you apply unique to anything bad, it's always worse. It's never good to be like, this
is such an interesting case. I've never seen this before, you have such a unique injury.
No, those are things you do not want to hear.
That means things are bad because they don't know how to fix you. If they've never seen something before, they don't know how to fix it.
To be honest, doctors are just like us.
They're just people. They've never encountered this. They're probably not going to be able to help out. The latest is that Lonzo plans on receiving a this is normal platelet rich plasma injection into the left knee. Kobe used to get that done in Germany all the time. They do it here now in the United States.
Very painful, but also very helpful.
He's gonna put that in his left knee to minimize the pain that he's experiencing from a pair.
Of operations that he end in twenty twenty two. Goodness, he's already had those bad news.
He's already had those like he's that's he knows the pain, but he's already had PRP in that same need in twenty eighteen.
I want to see Lonzo Ball back. He is so good. He was hitting his stride, he was finding his way.
He was in real NBA player After all the noise and smoke around the UCLA to Lakers sort of transition and LeVar Ball drama.
Medicine has made such incredible strides.
Right, Greg Godin, the former number one pick in the draft, his career was ended by micro fractures, right, which now in today's game, he would probably still be playing if those microfractures happened today because as opposed to fifteen years ago, because the microfracture surgery Odin had was basically discarded because it was trash for better techniques.
After he had those.
So the fact that this resolute revolution of medicine can't seem to figure out how to help Lonzo Ball is pretty heartbreaking. And all we can do is hope that the recovery goes well, and when the season starts, he's there. But it's an update that I've been trying to give to the people. We just haven't had time to get to it. But now you know, hopefully Lonzo Ball gets out there and is running the show in Chicago, because man, they do they need him.
All right.
Here's a question from someone in my DMS, and I wanted to address it because I think it's fun what players have coasted the longest on their potential. So I'm talking about players that everyone thought would break through and never did, right, Not guys that you thought would be pretty good and then they never were. Guys who had the talent to be stars but never ended up fulfilling that promise. I have three players on my list.
Frank Nelikina, Frank Nelikina Man.
Remember when New York yet Knicks drafted him. Everybody thought he was going to just be this breakthrough talent, that his shot would start to fall, he would figure it out.
No, never happened.
Never happened, despite four years as a New York Knick. Remember they put him on Tree Young. That's probably the most famous he'll ever be. He shot thirty nine percent for his career. He currently gets like ten minutes a game in Dallas. His shot has not been fixed. He is currently still shooting thirty eight percent in Dallas.
Number two Mobimba.
Everybody thought and Mobamba was gonna be electric. Magic spent four and a half years waiting on Mobamba. They were like, well, he'll figure it out, guys, he'll figure it out. He's he's a stretched big man, he can shoot the three. He's long, he's athletic, he has good personality. And you know what, he never did a guy everybody, everybody thought had the skills.
Necessary to be a star, and no he did not. We only got a song from it. That's it. That's all we have.
And I don't even think he was drafted when the song came out, So song could have just came and went. The Magic shipped him out for a bag of chips to the Lakers at this year's trade deadline. As we know, Number two is Mobamba.
Number three. Oh, this one's close to home. This one's so close to home.
Zach Collins from Gonzaga, tenth in the overall draft from the Portland Trailblazers. You know the Blazers. We've talked about this a million times, but I'll say it again. You know that Blazers moved up to get him at ten. You know they actually had two first round draft picks and they packaged them to get Zach Collins. The worst part about that, though, Zach Collins is like, okay, he's an okay player.
He's never going to be a star. Obviously he was reached for in the draft. That's fine. But the worst part about Zach Collins existing on the Portland Trailblazers.
Is that the Blazers passed on stars, elite players for Zach Collins. Let's talk about him, Donovan Mitchell. I mean, the list could just end there and that would be that.
But it doesn't. Bam at a bio could end there. It does not.
John Collins, Jared Allen, Kyle Kuzma, og An Andobi all went after Zach Collins. You could have just kept your first round picks and got two of those guys.
That hurts.
Also receiving votes from me is James Wiseman. Of course, James Wiseman's been coasting for the Warriors on potential pretty much alone.
Dante Exem, Dante Exem and the Adida's Nations.
They thought when he was sixteen years old he was going to be the next superstar. He was seen as the best sixteen year under kid in the world from Australia and he's just nobody Bizmack Biambo, who's seen as like a real talent, Taylor Horton, Tucker, Romeo Langford, Nikaile, Alexander Walker.
And that's it. That you can only live for so long on potential.
But some of these guys are probably gonna get an NBA pension and will magically figure things out when they never will. That's all the time that we after the heat Check, check back Tuesday for an all new full episode. Do not forget to watch the feed, and please follow the heat Check as a season head towards the playoffs and follow us on social at at this heat Check and at Trista Creek because the heat Check never sleeps.