{"id":763473,"date":"2026-02-20T01:06:37","date_gmt":"2026-02-20T01:06:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/763473\/"},"modified":"2026-02-20T01:06:37","modified_gmt":"2026-02-20T01:06:37","slug":"hornets-lamelo-ball-starts-against-the-rockets-a-day-after-being-in-a-car-crash","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/763473\/","title":{"rendered":"Hornets&#8217; LaMelo Ball starts against the Rockets a day after being in a car crash"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"ff-h fs-16 lh-1pt6 mg-b-15 article-content\" use-external-image=\"true\" data-v-d04fc069=\"\">CHARLOTTE, N.C. (AP) \u2014 <a href=\"https:\/\/www.foxsports.com\/nba\/charlotte-hornets-team\" class=\"entity\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Charlotte Hornets<\/a> point guard <a href=\"https:\/\/www.foxsports.com\/nba\/lamelo-ball-player\" class=\"entity\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">LaMelo Ball<\/a> started Thursday night&#8217;s game against the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.foxsports.com\/nba\/houston-rockets-team\" class=\"entity\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Houston Rockets<\/a>, one day after being involved in a two-car crash in Charlotte.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ff-h fs-16 lh-1pt6 mg-b-15 article-content\" use-external-image=\"true\" data-v-d04fc069=\"\">Hornets head coach Charles Lee said before the game Ball had no injuries stemming from the collision.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ff-h fs-16 lh-1pt6 mg-b-15 article-content\" use-external-image=\"true\" data-v-d04fc069=\"\">The Hornets are one of the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.foxsports.com\/nba\" class=\"entity\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">NBA<\/a>\u2019s hottest teams having won 10 of their last 11 games, and Ball is a big reason for that success.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ff-h fs-16 lh-1pt6 mg-b-15 article-content\" use-external-image=\"true\" data-v-d04fc069=\"\">Ball appeared to be driving through an intersection when his camouflage-colored, custom-made Hummer collided with another vehicle Wednesday, according to video obtained by WSOC-TV in Charlotte. The station later posted video of Ball, wearing an aqua-colored Hornets hoodie, getting out his truck and into another car before being driven away. Police were on the scene at the time.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ff-h fs-16 lh-1pt6 mg-b-15 article-content\" use-external-image=\"true\" data-v-d04fc069=\"\">A police report has not been made available.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ff-h fs-16 lh-1pt6 mg-b-15 article-content\" use-external-image=\"true\" data-v-d04fc069=\"\">There was no information available on the person in the other car involved in the collision, although video showed that driver calmly get out of his car and begin walking toward Ball\u2019s truck after the crash.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ff-h fs-16 lh-1pt6 mg-b-15 article-content\" use-external-image=\"true\" data-v-d04fc069=\"\">Video showed the left front tire of Ball\u2019s truck was missing.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ff-h fs-16 lh-1pt6 mg-b-15 article-content\" use-external-image=\"true\" data-v-d04fc069=\"\">Ball is just the latest professional sports athlete to be involved in a car crash in Charlotte.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ff-h fs-16 lh-1pt6 mg-b-15 article-content\" use-external-image=\"true\" data-v-d04fc069=\"\">Former <a href=\"https:\/\/www.foxsports.com\/nfl\/carolina-panthers-team\" class=\"entity\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Carolina Panthers<\/a> quarterback Cam Newton fractured his back in a 2014 crash in which he flipped his pickup truck near Bank of America Stadium \u2014 less than a mile from where Ball\u2019s crash occurred.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ff-h fs-16 lh-1pt6 mg-b-15 article-content\" use-external-image=\"true\" data-v-d04fc069=\"\">And in 2024, Panthers current backup quarterback Andy Dalton injured his thumb when he was involved in a two-car crash in Charlotte.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ff-h fs-16 lh-1pt6 mg-b-15 article-content\" use-external-image=\"true\" data-v-d04fc069=\"\">Former Hornets guard Bobby Phills was killed in a car crash at age 30 following a practice on Jan. 12, 2000.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ff-h fs-16 lh-1pt6 mg-b-15 article-content\" use-external-image=\"true\" data-v-d04fc069=\"\">___<\/p>\n<p class=\"ff-h fs-16 lh-1pt6 mg-b-15 article-content\" use-external-image=\"true\" data-v-d04fc069=\"\">AP NBA: https:\/\/apnews.com\/hub\/NBA<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"CHARLOTTE, N.C. (AP) \u2014 Charlotte Hornets point guard LaMelo Ball started Thursday night&#8217;s game against the Houston Rockets,&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":190770,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2075],"tags":[235,260,2567,30455,7,13729,108655,11087,6,236],"class_list":{"0":"post-763473","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-carolina-panthers","8":"tag-carolina","9":"tag-carolina-panthers","10":"tag-carolinapanthers","11":"tag-charlotte-hornets","12":"tag-football","13":"tag-houston-rockets","14":"tag-lamelo-ball","15":"tag-national-basketball-association","16":"tag-nfl","17":"tag-panthers"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/116100280076159005","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/763473","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=763473"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/763473\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/190770"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=763473"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=763473"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=763473"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}