Sion Williamson is still troubled by the comments he heard about himself.
He went from being an NBA favorite to hitting it big after gaining weight while rehabbing a broken right foot that sidelined him last season.
It’s a nightmare for Williamson, who was selected No. 1 overall by New Orleans in the 2019 draft and was projected to be an MVP-caliber player, but instead has been reduced to being a magnet for lighthearted jokes.
“What people don’t understand is, even writers and stuff, if they have kids of their own, imagine if someone talked about their kid the way they talked about me,” Williamson said. to FOX Sports last week. “In criticizing my body, they criticize the way I look. Every time they talk about me, it’s heavy. The way I look, I don’t even think they understand the effect it can have on you.”
A lot has changed for Williamson since.
He was tight-lipped about whether he could lose weight by showing up to training camp with a slimmed-down frame. And he immediately silenced those who doubted whether he could be great again with a 25-point, nine-rebound game in his regular season debut against the Brooklyn Nets last month.
After a recent game against the Los Angeles Lakers, LeBron James spoke about Williamson.
“You’ve never seen a talent like his size, his speed, his athleticism,” James said. “Like Giannis [Antetokounmpo]. Just like [Charles] Barkley. Like Shaq [O’Neal]. There’s just some talent that’s come into our league that you’ve never seen before.”
For Williamson, his journey back to superstardom has been circuitous and painful.
Last season, Williamson fell into a dark hole after suffering an injury in the spring and then experiencing a setback with his foot. At first, it is expected that he will be out of action for five weeks before he starts playing. But in December, a photo showed a setback in bone healing.
He felt as if the rug had been pulled out from under him. Williamson tried to hide his sadness. But Pelicans assistant coach Teresa Weatherspoon could see his pain through the ceiling he tried to cover.
“He wore a smile that, to me, I knew wasn’t a smile,” she said. “He took her to throw people away from what he really felt.”
Unable to play baseball or exercise, Williamson’s weight rose. It quickly became internet food. The images that he appears to be heavy have gone viral. Reddit forums are dedicated to people guessing how much he weighs and making fun of him.
“It’s a weird thing because with lower body injuries, that affects how you walk, that affects how you run, how you do daily activities and how you move,” Williamson said. “For the world to criticize me like that and all I’m trying to do is keep my feet on the ground? It’s been a lot. I’m not going to lie to you – It’s been a lot.”
Williamson immersed himself in music, especially Notorious BIG’s album “Ready To Die,” which he says “changed my life” because it helped him appreciate being alive. And he depends on the support of his circle.
Weatherspoon became a reliable shoulder to cry on. Pelicans coach Willie Green, who suffered a torn ACL in his third season and said his weight went from 205 to 230 during that time, understands what Williamson is going through and knows how to relate.
“He never asked me questions,” said Williamson of Green. “He would always let me know, ‘Z, if you need someone to talk to, let’s go have lunch or dinner.’
Williamson’s mother and father are well-intentioned, but sometimes they read stories about them and call their son to pepper him with questions about his progress, which stresses him out even more.
“I was like, ‘Y’all relax, hearing it from you isn’t going to help me and it’s actually making it worse,'” Williamson said. “So, when I broke it like that, they understood, once my leg heals, I’ll be back on track.”
He was cleared to resume basketball operations in March and returned to the team in New Orleans to cheer them on following a two-month rehab stint at Nike’s campus in Beaverton, Oregon. In July, he agreed to a contract extension with the Pelicans worth at least $193 million in incentives, though it reportedly included weight gain and body fat.
During the break, Williamson did a two-day workout in South Florida with Jasper Bibbs, a sports medicine specialist. Williamson would wake up at 4:30 a.m. for his first workout before practicing again at night, alternating between the football field and the basketball court.
“It gave my mind mental training, sharp training,” Williamson said.
Williamson also hired a chef, Jonas Lewis, to make breakfast, lunch, dinner and every snack seven days a week from July to September. Lewis, a former football player at the University of South Florida, lost 120 pounds just by changing his diet after he weighed 347 pounds after his athletic career.
Lewis first put Williamson through a detox followed by a cycling program, in which he would eat mostly protein and vegetables and only add healthy carbohydrates on certain days of the week. The goal is for Williamson to lose weight without losing muscle mass while burning what Lewis estimates is more than 2,000 calories a day through exercise.
The system was very successful.
“I don’t know if I should say the number, but I’ll say this: [He lost] more than 35 pounds, for sure,” Lewis said. “We’re losing about 7-9 pounds a week. By the third week, he’s starting to see results. You can’t pay Zion to wear his shirt.”
One time, Lewis made Williamson turkey bolognese, but he substituted pasta for zucchini, cucumbers, spinach and arugula. After serving the dish, Lewis explained the ingredients to Williamson, just as chefs do to their customers.
But Williamson cried in disgust. From there, a new understanding was gained.
“I said, ‘You know what? We shouldn’t go there,'” Lewis said. “And he said, ‘Yes, you’re right. Don’t even tell me, boss, just keep doing what you’re doing. It’s weird. So, I went on, and I stopped telling him exactly what I was doing. is in [the food].”
(Turkey bolognese became one of Williamson’s favorite dishes, so Lewis eventually cut it.)
Lewis continues to add spirulina to Williamson’s smoothies. He will make it with mashed white potatoes instead of mashed potatoes, and add truffles and garlic to add flavor. For dinner, he will always serve either white fish or fish with some protein. (Some of Williamson’s favorites are the hot lemon-pepper tiger wings with garlic and butter.)
First, Lewis will prepare Williamson’s plate to ensure portion control. But in order to work, Williamson makes it clear that he needs to feel like he’s not eating. He asked to eat the family style so that he does not feel restricted. Williamson wants to learn how to make the right choices for himself.
Eventually, Williamson’s tastes changed. He started enjoying healthy food and low sugar cravings.
Before meeting Lewis, Williamson had some bad habits he needed to shake.
“Every time he goes to get food, he has two large Dr. Peppers with him or four large Cokes and that’s before he even touches his food,” Lewis said. “You know what soda does to you? I think it was five weeks, he stopped even tasting soda because it was actually fruit and water every day.”
Williamson has kept the weight off and is currently in the best shape of his life.
It is strong while also being agile. He can cut through the defense and power of the transporter, but he also activates the notification for a while to find the person who opens or executes a finesse shot. He has an unusual combination of strength and speed, a bulldozer player who can pirouette.
So far this season, Williamson is averaging 22.7 points on 52.4 percent shooting, 6.9 rebounds and 3.7 assists in 31.9 minutes per game for the Pelicans, who are seventh in the Western Conference with a 5-4 record. After a 17-month absence, he looked sharper than ever.
“He knows he can be better,” Green said. “That’s scary.”
Williamson actually believes the world has seen little of what he can do. Now the biggest challenge he faces is not to show that he is wrong. He proves himself right.
“There’s a lot of potential I have that I haven’t shown,” Williamson said. “There are abilities that I will show when I am training or playing one-on-one, [but] in a game, I will be in my head where I want to be this perfect or I want to feel that I can make all the shots that I thought I wasn’t going to shoot my midrange or I wasn’t going to shoot the 3. I have the ability to do all of that and more. think.”
Weatherspoon always sees what he’s capable of. She said Williamson can go either way and shoot from anywhere on the court. She said, “everyone saw and went to the rim.”
James also thinks the sky is the limit for Williamson.
“It’s really funny when you hear people say, ‘Stop him from going left. Stop him from going left,'” James said. “That’s just what I’ve heard over the years with [Manu] Ginobili, you just keep him from going left. Lamar Odom, you keep him from going left. When you’re big, it doesn’t matter what you do, they. “I’ll find out. way. So, Zion is about to become an adult. He will be in this league for a long time.”
He went from being the laughing stock of internet trolls to being the face of the league singing their praises. He went from being at the nadir of his life to full of hope for his future. He went from worrying about whether he would play baseball again to setting his hopes on being one of the best to ever play the game.
But more than anything, he regained his happiness. Now that he was smiling, Weatherspoon believed him.
“It’s a real smile,” she said.
For Williamson, the past year has been a tough one. But he also taught him an important lesson.
It’s nothing to be trifled with.
“If it’s God’s plan for me not to play basketball, it’s part of His plan,” Williamson said. “But if it is in his plan to play basketball, then I will do as much as I can.”
Melissa Rohlin is an NBA writer for FOX Sports. She previously covered the tournament for Sports Illustrated, the Los Angeles Times, the Bay Area News Network and the San Antonio Express-News. Follow her on Twitter @melissarohlin.
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How much does Zion weight?
How much weight did Zion lose? ‘Fat Sion Williamson’ weight loss at 284lbs led NBA Twitter to question his health. Zion Williamson appeared slimed during the New Orleans Pelicans’ media day ahead of the 2022-23 season.
How much does Zion weigh now?
Now Zion Williamson may be thinner than we’ve ever seen in the NBA right now. Heck, he’s only 282 lbs, just the right weight to even beat Giannis Antetokounmpo.
How tall is Zion and how much does he weigh?
Zion is officially listed at 6-foot-6 and 284 pounds. Read also : Living a ‘Studio Vegan’ Lifestyle. That makes him the fourth heaviest player in the league behind 7-foot-5, 311-pound free agent Tacko Fall, 7-foot-4 , 290-pound Boban Marjanovic of the Houston Rockets and 6-foot-11, 290-pound Jusuf Nurkic of the Portland Trail Blazers.
What does Zion mean in Hebrew?
Zion is a specific place of historical importance – the name refers to both the hill in Jerusalem and the city itself – but it is also used more generally to mean "holy place" or “the kingdom of heaven”. The root of Zion is the Hebrew Tsiyon, and while the word is important in the Jewish faith. On the same subject : The 10 best tripods for traveling in 2022: the best tripods for travel…
What does Zion mean in the Bible? The name Zion is often used to describe the place that God has appointed where His followers will live and worship God. Scripture refers to Zion as the “Holy City” and “the city of refuge” where God protects his people from the evil things in the world.
What does Zion mean in Latin?
Zion means (place, proper) Heaven; the city of heaven. On the same subject : Adele’s seventh weight loss comes down to 3 lifestyle changes. name.
What is the meaning of Zion in Greek?
Zion is a specific, historically important place – the name means both the hill in the city of Jerusalem and the city itself – but it is also used more generally to mean “holy place” or “heavenly kingdom”. The root of Zion is the Hebrew Tsiyon. , and while the word is important in the Jewish faith…
How heavy is Zion Williamson currently?
Zion is officially listed at 6-foot-6 and 284 pounds.
What is Sion Williamson’s weight now? His current weight listed on NBA.com is 284 pounds. The Pelicans signed Williamson to a five-year max extension worth at least $193 million in July.
What type of surgery did Zion have?
“He had a fractured right foot that was surgically repaired,” Griffin said, according to ESPN’s Andrew Lopez.
Why did Zion have surgery?
Williamson suffered a fractured fifth metatarsal in his right foot during the summer and required surgery to repair it. Since then, Williamson has suffered several setbacks and left New Orleans to focus on rehabbing his leg.
