Watch LaVar Ball's reaction the first time he confronted his son about shoplifting
In public, LaVar Ball tried to downplay the serious nature of his son LiAngelo’s arrest in China in November for shoplifting.
But in private, Ball was clearly not happy with his son for taking a pair of designer sunglasses from a store in China while traveling with the UCLA men’s basketball team.
A teaser for the upcoming episode of the Facebook reality series “Ball in the Family” shows the patriarch of the Ball family meeting his nervous son, in a hotel room, for the first time after his arrest.
“Why would you like some glasses?” Ball asked. “The thrill?”
“I just liked how they looked,” LiAngelo replied.
LaVar Ball, seemingly stunned at his son’s response, lashed back.
“[Bleep] like that will get you f—ed up!” Ball said.
Earlier in the clip, LiAngelo looked into the camera and said, “My team, my dad and my family — I feel like I let them down.”
In a second clip for the program, LaVar Ball told an interviewer, “It can really be dangerous when you do something in somebody else’s country that you’re not supposed to do even in your country.”
The clip also depicts Tina Ball, LaVar Ball’s wife and the mother of the Ball brothers, crying as she worries about LiAngelo’s safety while he was being detained by Chinese authorities.
The shoplifting incident created international headlines and resulted in Ball and two other UCLA freshmen — Cody Riley and Jalen Hall — being suspended from the team.
Ball withdrew from school, while Riley and Hall were suspended for the remainder of the season.
The decision by LaVar Ball to pull his son from UCLA prompted him to seek opportunities for LiAngelo and younger brother LaMelo — who Ball pulled from Chino Hills High School in October — to play professional basketball overseas.
The brothers signed a contract with the Prienai-Birstonas Vytautas team in the Lithuanian professional league and will make their debut with the team Tuesday.
The episode of “Ball in the Family” debuts Sunday on the reality series’ Facebook Watch page.
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