Who are the best former EuroLeague players in the NBA?

The 2023 NBA off-season brought another summer of EuroLeague’s best crossing the Atlantic to join the best and biggest league in the world. Last season’s MVP, Sasha Vezenkov, joined the Sacramento Kings and the 2021 EuroLeague MVP Vasilije Micic signed with the Oklahoma City Thunder. 

This is nothing new. Almost every summer the EuroLeague’s best players get poached by the NBA. With some exceptions - Sergio Llull, Dejan Bodiroga, Dimitris Diamandtidis, and others - the best players in the world eventually want to play in the best league in the world. But for as often as players decide to make the jump, a fair number head back quickly.

So who are the best former EuroLeague players in the NBA?

We selected a top-5 based on current NBA rosters and did our best to rank them accordingly. There may be disagreements, but remember that these players are being ranked mainly by their NBA performance with exceptions made for rookies. For the rookies, we will be making educated guesses on how their skills will translate and have already gone in-depth on both Micic and Vezenkov this off-season. 

Plenty of good NBA players did not make the cut here, and that doesn’t mean we don’t think they’re good, we just think the five we chose are better. Goga Bitadze, Joe Ingles, Daniel Theis, Filip Petrusev, and others are all good players but at a lower level than the core we selected. 

Some overseas transports did not play in EuroLeague either. Maxi Kleber never did, for example, even though he had a few professional seasons in Europe under his belt before coming over. Never playing in EuroLeague is also a common trend for youngsters such as the Miami Heat’s Nikola Jovic. Most players in this age range are also not talented enough to qualify for this top-5. 

Lastly, an honorable mention for P.J. Tucker. The geriatric bowing ball-shaped defensive stopper and NBA champion spent five seasons overseas after getting cut by the Toronto Raptors as a rookie. He played in EuroLeague for German club Brose Bamberg in his final season. If you ever wanted to see a highlight reel of Tucker iso’s, here you go.

Now, here are the 5 best former EuroLeague players in the NBA.

5 best former EuroLeague players currently in the NBA

5. Vasilije Micic, Anadolu Efes Istanbul to the Oklahoma City Thunder

A 6-foot-5 pick-and-roll master and basketball wizard, Vasilije Micic is finally coming over to the NBA at 29 years old. Sam Hinkie drafted Micic late in the second round of the 2014 NBA Draft. The Serbian guard was not a super well-known prospect at the time and was not a well-known stash player for a while. We took a deep dive into Micic’s career, and his need for freedom to succeed in the NBA, earlier this summer. 

For most of his early 20s, Micic was a role-player guard. He had decent size, knocked down open shots, and could run pick-and-roll. He was a serviceable rotation player, and nothing more. That all changed when he joined Anadolu Efes Istanbul in the summer of 2018. Micic exploded and became one of the best players in EuroLeague. He earned MVP honors for the 2020-21 season and helped lead Efes to back-to-back titles in 2021 and 2022. 

After Efes failed to make the EuroLeague playoffs last season, both Micic and head coach Ergin Ataman decided to leave the club. Micic signed with the Oklahoma City Thunder who acquired his draft rights from the Sixers in the Al Horford salary dump trade. He is a rookie, but one of the most experienced the league has ever seen.