Speaker 1: I know that we normally try to make jokes here,
Speaker 1: but sometimes you got to cover a subject that no
Speaker 1: matter how much I try, I find humor in it,
Speaker 1: And like I can't find zero humor in this, we
Speaker 1: got to talk about Lonzo Ball.
Speaker 2: This thing is out of control. It is so sad.
Speaker 1: First of all, Lonzo is not only a great player,
Speaker 1: but the Bulls haven't really recovered since he went down
Speaker 1: last season.
Speaker 2: I think they were number one in the East at
Speaker 2: one point.
Speaker 1: But he's also a good dude. He's a really good dude,
Speaker 1: beloved by his teammates. The Ball brothers are, by every
Speaker 1: account that I've heard of, totally good guys.
Speaker 2: How good was he with the Bulls when the Bulls?
Speaker 1: When the Bulls were playing with Lonzo Ball, they were
Speaker 1: the number one seed in the East. He was shooting
Speaker 1: forty two from three, and even more important, the Bulls
Speaker 1: loud eight point six year points per game when compared
Speaker 1: to when he was off the court, that was top
Speaker 1: four percent in the entire NBA. Defense never recovered since
Speaker 1: he left. So I don't know if that makes the
Speaker 1: Lonzo Ball injury update more painful to hear, but it's
Speaker 1: certainly if you're the Bulls doesn't make it any less painful,
Speaker 1: so they officially the Bulls shut down Lonzo Ball for
Speaker 1: the season last week.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I don't think you're shocked.
Speaker 1: I'm not shocked, but it's it's kind of scary considering
Speaker 1: that we didn't see him play most of last year.
Speaker 1: Now we haven't seen him play this year, and it's
Speaker 1: pretty jarring to hear. When the reason came out behind it,
Speaker 1: it's probably even more difficult to process. So just to
Speaker 1: recap the timeline, because it's weird and complicated and it
Speaker 1: took a while. January fourteenth, Lonzo Ball tore his meniscus,
Speaker 1: pretty simple, pretty normal injury that we've seen in the
Speaker 1: NBA under the knife, goes and gets arthroscopic surgery right after,
Speaker 1: misses the rest of the season, which you could say
Speaker 1: some people do come back from meniscus tears with surgery,
Speaker 1: some people don't. Not cause for concern yet, the timeline
Speaker 1: from being able to play following surgery sometimes can range
Speaker 1: from four to six months, so okay.
Speaker 2: The dark clouds then begin to form.
Speaker 1: Eight months later, in September, Lonzo then has a second
Speaker 1: surgery on the same knee, on the same tear.
Speaker 2: The Bulls said it would.
Speaker 1: Just be a few months just to clean up, which
Speaker 1: is obviously a lie, and they were looking at it
Speaker 1: January twenty twenty three return date. But then January twenty
Speaker 1: eighth came and Billy Donovan let it slip that Lonzo
Speaker 1: Ball was nowhere near returning to the court, and in fact,
Speaker 1: it actually became known that Lonzo Ball was still in
Speaker 1: pain and wasn't even able to run yet.
Speaker 2: Wow. The Bulls released this statement.
Speaker 1: Despite making significant increases in strength and function over the
Speaker 1: past several months, Bulls guard Lonzo Ball continues to experience
Speaker 1: performance limiting discomfort during participation and high level basketball activities.
Speaker 1: Considering the time required to achieve the necessary level of
Speaker 1: fitness to return to play and the current stage of
Speaker 1: the NBA season, Ball will not return this season. The
Speaker 1: focus for him will be to continue to be on
Speaker 1: the resolution of his discomfort and a full return for
Speaker 1: the twenty twenty three twenty twenty four season.
Speaker 2: So what's wrong?
Speaker 1: According to his dad, LaVar Ball, Lonzo has quote debris
Speaker 1: and a nerve.
Speaker 2: What does that mean?
Speaker 1: I don't actually know what that means. Is that like
Speaker 1: when you get dust in your eye? Because that stuff's
Speaker 1: really painful. Is that like the expanded dust in the
Speaker 1: eye scenario. The issue apparently is even more complicated because
Speaker 1: Tristan Thompson went on ESPN and reported that doctors have
Speaker 1: told Lonzo Ball that this is a unique injury that
Speaker 1: they have never seen before. So it was not just
Speaker 1: a meniscus tear. So when you apply unique to anything bad,
Speaker 1: it's always worse. It's never good to be like, this
Speaker 1: is such an interesting case. I've never seen this before,
Speaker 1: you have such a unique injury.
Speaker 2: No, those are things you do not want to hear.
Speaker 1: That means things are bad because they don't know how
Speaker 1: to fix you. If they've never seen something before, they
Speaker 1: don't know how to fix it.
Speaker 2: To be honest, doctors are just like us.
Speaker 1: They're just people. They've never encountered this. They're probably not
Speaker 1: going to be able to help out. The latest is
Speaker 1: that Lonzo plans on receiving a this is normal platelet
Speaker 1: rich plasma injection into the left knee. Kobe used to
Speaker 1: get that done in Germany all the time. They do
Speaker 1: it here now in the United States.
Speaker 2: Very painful, but also very helpful.
Speaker 1: He's gonna put that in his left knee to minimize
Speaker 1: the pain that he's experiencing from a pair.
Speaker 2: Of operations that he end in twenty twenty two. Goodness,
Speaker 2: he's already had those bad news.
Speaker 1: He's already had those like he's that's he knows the pain,
Speaker 1: but he's already had PRP in that same need in
Speaker 1: twenty eighteen.
Speaker 2: I want to see Lonzo Ball back. He is so good.
Speaker 2: He was hitting his stride, he was finding his way.
Speaker 1: He was in real NBA player After all the noise
Speaker 1: and smoke around the UCLA to Lakers sort of transition
Speaker 1: and LeVar Ball drama.
Speaker 2: Medicine has made such incredible strides.
Speaker 1: Right, Greg Godin, the former number one pick in the draft,
Speaker 1: his career was ended by micro fractures, right, which now
Speaker 1: in today's game, he would probably still be playing if
Speaker 1: those microfractures happened today because as opposed to fifteen years ago,
Speaker 1: because the microfracture surgery Odin had was basically discarded because
Speaker 1: it was trash for better techniques.
Speaker 2: After he had those.
Speaker 1: So the fact that this resolute revolution of medicine can't
Speaker 1: seem to figure out how to help Lonzo Ball is
Speaker 1: pretty heartbreaking. And all we can do is hope that
Speaker 1: the recovery goes well, and when the season starts, he's there.
Speaker 1: But it's an update that I've been trying to give
Speaker 1: to the people. We just haven't had time to get
Speaker 1: to it. But now you know, hopefully Lonzo Ball gets
Speaker 1: out there and is running the show in Chicago, because man,
Speaker 1: they do they need him.
Speaker 2: All right.
Speaker 1: Here's a question from someone in my DMS, and I
Speaker 1: wanted to address it because I think it's fun what
Speaker 1: players have coasted the longest on their potential. So I'm
Speaker 1: talking about players that everyone thought would break through and
Speaker 1: never did, right, Not guys that you thought would be
Speaker 1: pretty good and then they never were. Guys who had
Speaker 1: the talent to be stars but never ended up fulfilling
Speaker 1: that promise. I have three players on my list.
Speaker 2: Frank Nelikina, Frank Nelikina Man.
Speaker 1: Remember when New York yet Knicks drafted him. Everybody thought
Speaker 1: he was going to just be this breakthrough talent, that
Speaker 1: his shot would start to fall, he would figure it out.
Speaker 2: No, never happened.
Speaker 1: Never happened, despite four years as a New York Knick.
Speaker 1: Remember they put him on Tree Young. That's probably the
Speaker 1: most famous he'll ever be. He shot thirty nine percent
Speaker 1: for his career. He currently gets like ten minutes a
Speaker 1: game in Dallas. His shot has not been fixed. He
Speaker 1: is currently still shooting thirty eight percent in Dallas.
Speaker 2: Number two Mobimba.
Speaker 1: Everybody thought and Mobamba was gonna be electric. Magic spent
Speaker 1: four and a half years waiting on Mobamba. They were like, well,
Speaker 1: he'll figure it out, guys, he'll figure it out. He's
Speaker 1: he's a stretched big man, he can shoot the three.
Speaker 1: He's long, he's athletic, he has good personality. And you
Speaker 1: know what, he never did a guy everybody, everybody thought
Speaker 1: had the skills.
Speaker 2: Necessary to be a star, and no he did not.
Speaker 2: We only got a song from it. That's it. That's
Speaker 2: all we have.
Speaker 1: And I don't even think he was drafted when the
Speaker 1: song came out, So song could have just came and went.
Speaker 1: The Magic shipped him out for a bag of chips
Speaker 1: to the Lakers at this year's trade deadline. As we know,
Speaker 1: Number two is Mobamba.
Speaker 2: Number three. Oh, this one's close to home. This one's
Speaker 2: so close to home.
Speaker 1: Zach Collins from Gonzaga, tenth in the overall draft from
Speaker 1: the Portland Trailblazers. You know the Blazers. We've talked about
Speaker 1: this a million times, but I'll say it again. You
Speaker 1: know that Blazers moved up to get him at ten.
Speaker 1: You know they actually had two first round draft picks
Speaker 1: and they packaged them to get Zach Collins. The worst
Speaker 1: part about that, though, Zach Collins is like, okay, he's
Speaker 1: an okay player.
Speaker 2: He's never going to be a star. Obviously he was
Speaker 2: reached for in the draft. That's fine. But the worst
Speaker 2: part about Zach Collins existing on the Portland Trailblazers.
Speaker 1: Is that the Blazers passed on stars, elite players for
Speaker 1: Zach Collins. Let's talk about him, Donovan Mitchell. I mean,
Speaker 1: the list could just end there and that would be that.
Speaker 2: But it doesn't. Bam at a bio could end there.
Speaker 2: It does not.
Speaker 1: John Collins, Jared Allen, Kyle Kuzma, og An Andobi all
Speaker 1: went after Zach Collins. You could have just kept your
Speaker 1: first round picks and got two of those guys.
Speaker 2: That hurts.
Speaker 1: Also receiving votes from me is James Wiseman. Of course,
Speaker 1: James Wiseman's been coasting for the Warriors on potential pretty
Speaker 1: much alone.
Speaker 2: Dante Exem, Dante Exem and the Adida's Nations.
Speaker 1: They thought when he was sixteen years old he was
Speaker 1: going to be the next superstar. He was seen as
Speaker 1: the best sixteen year under kid in the world from
Speaker 1: Australia and he's just nobody Bizmack Biambo, who's seen as
Speaker 1: like a real talent, Taylor Horton, Tucker, Romeo Langford, Nikaile,
Speaker 1: Alexander Walker.
Speaker 2: And that's it. That you can only live for so
Speaker 2: long on potential.
Speaker 1: But some of these guys are probably gonna get an
Speaker 1: NBA pension and will magically figure things out when they
Speaker 1: never will. That's all the time that we after the
Speaker 1: heat Check, check back Tuesday for an all new full episode.
Speaker 1: Do not forget to watch the feed, and please follow
Speaker 1: the heat Check as a season head towards the playoffs
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Speaker 1: and at Trista Creek because the heat Check never sleeps.