Even Erik Spoelstra Is Pleased LaMelo Ball Avoided Suspension
Following the Charlotte Hornets' victory over the Miami Heat, many around the NBA world wanted LaMelo Ball to be suspended. He tripped Bam Adebayo on a play that resulted in Adebayo leaving the game and not coming back. The Heat would go on to lose by one, and Erik Spoelstra was incensed that the officials missed it on the floor.
He ripped Ball in the postgame press conference, and the NBA announced it would investigate. There has been a heated debate over whether it was an intentional and dirty play by Ball. Eventually, the league announced it was upgrading Ball's infraction to a Flagrant 2 and fining him, but he won't be suspended.
That has set some NBA fans, especially fans of the Heat, ablaze. If he would've been ejected from one game, why should he play in another game for a playoff spot? Well, among those disagreeing with that sentiment is Spoelstra himself.
Erik Spoelstra supports the NBA's LaMelo Ball decision
LaMelo Ball should have, according to the NBA's retroactive ruling, been ejected from a 127-126 overtime win that came on the back of a Ball game-winning layup with four seconds remaining. The league essentially thought he probably shouldn't have had the chance.
So, the natural response is to not let him play the next game, right? Wrong, according to the NBA, and that's not a problem in Erik Spoelstra's eyes. As angry as he was about it during and after the game, he'd prefer to let it lie.
"I didn't think that he needed to be penalized more moving forward. I don't think that would make sense," Spoelstra said Thursday in his Heat exit press conference. After sitting on it for two days, the coach appears to have let the issue go.
Plenty in the NBA media circuit disagreed. If Ball were out, it would significantly change the Hornets' plans and impact their chances of beating the Magic. Instead, they can possibly get into the playoffs while the Heat, thanks partially to Adebayo's exit in the loss, are in the lottery.
Not dirty, Spoelstra says
LaMelo Ball hasn't had many issues like this in six NBA seasons. He doesn't have the reputation that Draymond Green, Dillon Brooks, and Grayson Allen, for example, have. Still, the dirty label has been thrown around. Not by Erik Spoelstra, though, even if he thinks the isolated play was.
"I don't think he's a dirty player. I just think, in that moment, all things can be true," Spoelstra said. "It was a dirty play and a dangerous play. It should have been caught at that moment. But it wasn't and then, you know, you move on."
Ball said after that he didn't mean to do it and was unaware of his surroundings after being hit in the head, but that he'd talk with Adebayo and apologize. "It didn't happen," the Heat forward said. "I want it to be out there. At some point I'll see him again and we'll have that conversation."
Hornets coach reacts
One person who's also pretty happy that LaMelo Ball will be available for the Hornets is head coach Charles Lee. The second-year boss has his team on the cusp of the playoffs, and Ball is hugely important to that.
"I think the league handed out something that was what they deemed to be fair," Lee said before the team flew to Orlando. "And we're glad that we still have him going on to the next game. I know he never has the intent to try to hurt anybody out there on the court. But I'm glad everything's kind of settled now."
The flagrant points won't do anything, because the Play-In is its own entity. They don't count for postseason or regular season play, so while it's a harsh penalty, it doesn't do much to Ball.
