NBA Rookie Ladder: Meet the foreign fab five
In this week’s NBA Rookie Ladder, meet five international rookies who are showing out this season.
The NBA’s growth and expansion hasn’t just happened on the continental United States. Under David Stern and Adam Silver the NBA has become a truly global game. From exhibitions in China to regular season games — and potentially a NBA Gatorade League franchise — in Mexico, the league is placing its footprint all across the world.
This is reflected by the fact that on opening night of the 2017-18 NBA Season, there were a total of 108 international-born players from 42 different countries on the 30 rosters. Those 42 countries are: Argentina, Australia, Austria, Bahamas, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Brazil, Cameroon, Canada, Croatia, Czech Republic, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Dominican Republic, Egypt, Finland, France, Gerogia, Germany, Greece, Haiti, Israel, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Mali, Montenegro, New Zealand, Poland, Puerto Rico, Republic of the Congo, Russia, Senegal, Serbia, Slovenia, South Sudan, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Sudan, Tunisia, Turkey, Ukraine, and United Kingdom.
It feels like if you were to spin a globe and stop it by placing your finger on a country it would be highly likely someone from there is playing in the NBA today.
We’ve seen the likes of Tim Duncan (U.S. Virgin Islands), Patrick Ewing (Jamaica), Pau Gasol (Spain) Manu Ginobili (Argentina), Yao Ming (China) Dikembe Mutumbo (Democratic Republic of the Congo), Steve Nash (Canada), Dirk Nowitzki (Germany), Hakeem Olajuwon (Nigeria), and Tony Parker (France) produce Hall of Fame careers in the NBA as international superstars.
As basketball continues to expand its reach we will get more players entering the NBA from different parts of the world. Some of today’s headliners (Giannis Antetokounmpo, Joel Embiid, Kyrie Irving, Kristpas Porzingis, Karl-Anthony Towns and more) were not born on American soil.
This year’s rookie class has shown promise as a whole, and has given us a few more foreign favorites to root for. Let’s look at the five most impressive international rookies in the NBA today.