The biggest story in basketball right now is superstar guard LaMelo Ball being traded to the Minnesota Timberwolves, but it’s his father, Lavar Ball, who has a heavy heart.

The founder of the Big Baller Brand told podcaster N3on that his wife of 30 years, Tina, left him recently.

“Even with my wife. Tina decided to go her own way. That’s why you don’t see her right here,” Ball said. “She wanted to go do something else, that’s fine with me. We had our run. We had our run.”

The separation, according to Ball, reshapes the way he views her after she had a stroke in Feb. 2017.

“So, even though she had the stroke, and [is] getting older, she would never be like, ‘Oh, man.’ She was always beautiful in my eyes, until you want to go do something else. Now you not as beautiful to me again. If you decide to go this way, I’m gonna go that way. That’s fine. It is what it is, man,” Ball said.

“Any time you can find somebody you can stay in love with for a really long time… if you can witness that love, that’s good. I had that with her. And I found somebody else, but it is what it is.”

Lavar and Tina had three boys together — Lonzo, LaMelo, and Li’Angelo.

Lonzo and LaMelo have had respectable NBA careers — though not as prolific as the loud-mouthed LaVar predicted — while Li’Angelo is currently a rapper after a lengthy basketball career that never reached the heights of his brothers.

Ball, 58, adds that he has found someone else after the split, but didn’t divulge the name of the mystery woman.

“No need to worry! And you know what? I’m gonna give you something. It’s somebody who’s working for me. That’s what I’m telling you! That’s why,” Ball continued when asked who the woman was.

Ball has had health difficulties in recent years, having part of his right leg amputated in 2025, and has been moving around with a prosthetic.

It is unclear who his, seemingly, former wife is dating now, but the two have been married since 1997 and raised three boys together.