Los Angeles Lakers star LeBron James has played alongside great players and legends throughout his illustrious career. However, when he decided to sign with L.A. in 2018, he joined a youth movement led by Lonzo Ball.
So for that first season in L.A., James played next to essentially all younger, developing players, something that has not happened as the four-time champion is known to be on championship contenders throughout his career. Although Ball and James shared good moments on the floor together, things did not work out and the Lakers decided to go all in on Anthony Davis to win a championship in 2020.
Fast forward, the former UCLA product is now with the Chicago Bulls and has struggled with a knee injury causing him to miss two consecutive years. He finally is healthy though and made his preseason debut on Wednesday night and his former teammate James shared his support on Instagram:
LeBron James with a shoutout for Lonzo Ball after making his return tonight: pic.twitter.com/VdggZvT1Qx
— Daniel Starkand (@DStarkand) October 17, 2024
After surgeries not working to repair Ball’s knee, his NBA career became in jeopardy. Thankfully, he found an operation that fixed his left knee, giving him a new meniscus.
In 15 minutes, the 26-year-old looked great after missing two years of action. He put up 10 points on 4-for-6 from the field and 2-for-4 from 3-point range, which can do wonders for Ball heading into the regular season after missing so much time.
It will be interesting to monitor the kind of role he has for a rebuilding Bulls team and his workload since missing an extensive period of time. With Zach LaVine, Coby White and Josh Giddey starting, who knows what Ball’s role will be this season, but just the fact that he is healthy and on the court is great to see.
Bulls’ Lonzo Ball admits he would’ve traded himself for Anthony Davis
All of Lonzo Ball’s dreams came to fruition early in his career after for Chino Hills in high school, UCLA in college and getting drafted by the Lakers. Then the cherry on top is playing with his favorite player of all-time LeBron James when he signed with the team in 2018.
Unfortunately, injuries derailed the 2028-19 season for the Lakers and with Anthony Davis becoming available during the 2019 offseason, they jumped on it.
Now, five years removed from that blockbuster trade that included him, Ball shared no hard feelings about it. He would even go as far as to say that he would’ve traded himself for a player the caliber of Davis.
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