LaVar Ball Says Lakers Will Make Playoffs Next Season After Lonzo Drafted No. 2

LaVar Ball’s boisterous nature is not dying down anytime soon. The father of newly minted Los Angeles Laker Lonzo Ball made a playoff guarantee during his on-camera interview at the 2017 NBA draft.

"Lonzo Ball is going to take the Lakers to the playoffs in his first year,” LaVar said, per Mike Bresnahan of Spectrum SportsNet.

The Lakers, as expected, took Lonzo with the No. 2 overall pick. It's been a prophecy LaVar has been espousing ever since his son arrived at UCLA, and he's only grown louder as the draft approached. 

LaVar said in the interview he had his purple-and-gold Big Baller Brand hat made when his eldest son was a baby.

“You’re talking about 19, 20 years—just no one had a microphone on me when I was talking,” LaVar said. “It’s a wonderful feeling, but I already knew it was coming to him."

The Lakers paved the way to selecting Lonzo at No. 2 by trading incumbent point guard D’Angelo Russell to the Brooklyn Nets earlier this week. Russell and Timofey Mozgov were sent to Brooklyn in exchange for Brook Lopez and the No. 27 overall pick.

Just two years ago, Russell seemed like the team’s point guard of the future when he was taken No. 2 overall. Magic Johnson, the greatest point guard in basketball history and current Lakers president of basketball operations, decided to shift gears and make Ball his new focus.

"It's crazy, I couldn't ask for anything more, to be able to learn from [Johnson] every day is truly a blessing," Ball said, per Baxter Holmes of ESPN.

Say what you will about LaVar Ball, but he has been right at every turn. He had a child, said he would go to UCLA and play for the Lakers, and he's made it all happen. Maybe we should have been buying stock in the Big Baller Brand all along rather than making memes about $500 shoes.