Lithuanian div Sabonis

The paper is already yellow for a long time, but it still shows one thing unmistakably. No one in the history of the sport of the Soviet Union had better results in testing the physical predispositions than Arvydas Sabonis! When one looks at all the athletes defiling the mighty USSR, this is a bit unbelievable, but that's the case.

It's incredible the first word you think of when you see Sabonis.

Simple, huge man. I'm always in the face of the scene when the Physiotherapist of the Lithuanian team expels Arvydas, with his leg length as a whole physiotherapist. The foot in those huge sneakers looked like number 70, or somewhere.

For a man of these dimensions, Sabonis had an incredible sense of play throughout his career. The ball looked like a clatter in his hands, but it did not bother him with a very precise shot from the distance (somewhere on YT there is a clip of Arvydas to triple the triples without a Blacers training error), and to share the assistances as Larry Bird, with which he compared the legendary Bill Walton Center. It's just the hands that may have separated Sabas from the rest of the centers. He picked up all the balls, no matter what kind of addition it was. He threw the shot with one hand or spinning over the entire court, as a disc thrower to the teammate in the arms of the zicer. Assisted behind the back or through the legs of the opponents ...

When you look at the footage of young Sabonis from this distance, the first thing that strikes in the eye is the extraordinary coordination of the movement - a much more suitable 190cm beak than such an ugly one. That and the speed that moved around the field ...

If you are a male child born in Kaunas, the chance that you will kick in the basket at some point is about 99%. Sabonis did not have any where with his growth. Plus, since 13 years old, he has been regarded as an extraordinary talent. After only one look, the late Gomelsky said:

"This one will be something special" and, of course, the old wolf was right. Although, the Algerian student who first looks at basketball could have told you the same thing. Sabonis did not need any additional analysis. He was good and it was clear to everyone.

Yugoslavia and the Soviet Union developed a basketball rivalry that lasted long before Sabonis appeared. Matches with the USSR were resolved by Kicanovic, Slavnic, Delibasic ... especially Kic, who built a reputation for cold-bloodedness and miniatures in the uncertain finals against the Soviet Union. At that time, Tkachenko was a mountain under the basket, but without too much basketball knowledge. He could stun the opposing player with his index finger, but moved like a glacier.

Arvydas debuted as a teenager at the SP in Columbia in 1982, where the USSR won a gold medal. The match was mostly watched from the bench as well as the final against the USA, where Anatoly Mishkin scored 29 points. In 1985, the USSR won the new title of European champion. She suffered with 30 differences Czechoslovakia. Sabonis with tails and shoulders scored 23 points. This final was followed by the legendary Bill Walton from the theater, and was impressed by the end of the game of the then 20-year center ...

NBA teams showed interest in Sabonis in 1982, when the USSR team, in the framework of one of the many peace and sport contracts, started touring the US, where they played against college teams. The duel against the later draft of the draft of Ralph Sampson and his Virginie scored 13 points and 25 Sampson jumps, but also 21 points with 14 rebounds of the then 18-year-old Sabonis. After the Russians got his Indiana, Bobby Knight said: "He may be the best player out of America I've ever seen."

Atlanta never watched him, but it did not bother to draft it in the then legendary fourth round. Many commented on this as a service to the Russians, whom the then owner of Hawks and one of the founders of the Goodwill Games, media mogul Ted Turner, wants to get the real transfer of that tournament from Moscow. In the end, through Celtics, this selection of Hawks ended in the hands of Portland, a team that probably drafted all chronically injured players in the last 40 years.

After the Americans boycotted the OI in Moscow in 1980, the Soviets returned the same measure in Los Angeles four years later, and the rest were denied for the Sabonis-Jordan match.

Sabonis with his Žalgiris managed to break the dominance of CSKA in the national championship, which was especially great at that time. Žalgiris also reached the final of the Champions Cup in Budapest, where Cibona led Dražen and Cvjetičan won the second consecutive title of the European champion. Sabonis was following the career of a short fitting player through her career, which was used by Cibona centers. Sabas scored 27 points, but was excluded for hitting Mihovil Nakić and the story was over.

After that season, a series of injuries that would end the career of any other player, not Sabonis, also started. From this distance and after having most of the information, it remains a miracle that Arvydas has played for forty. Maybe that's the most talk about his gaming intelligence and his ability to adapt to the newly emerging situation.What was the situation? Let's just say that doctors in Portland, after his final visit to the NBA in 1995, made X-rays of his knees and feet. The conclusion was ... "It can get a parking spot for the disabled only on the basis of these two shots."

Achilles' tendon was first broken at 22, before the 1986 World Championships in Spain. He returned and led the USSR to a miraculous return to the semifinals against Yugoslavia, on which the bench was sitting Krešimir Ćosić. A game that still provokes a fever with our fathers. A lead of nine differences 50 seconds before the end was not enough to win. Three lost balls and three triples of the Soviets ... One of the Sabonis hit the board.

In the final, Arvydas played Egal with David Robinson, but none of the Russian backs could even take a taxi from Kenny Smith. Americans have won gold ...

Sabonis then broke Achilles' tendon on another leg. The operation was carried out in Portland, but the Soviet basketball federation infuriated his return to the field to play the strongest at the Seoul Olympics and received a duel with the US, after both boys and girls finally quit the boycott.

The Americans sent the best possible team of college players, but John Thompson on the bench was not up to the level of the task. Gomeljski simply had more tricks than the often rigid Thompson, which did not much help even that his players had beaten with 30 differences until that match. Sabonis, although insufficiently recovered again, played solidly in the semifinals, and scored 20 points with 15 rebounds in a victory against Yugoslavia in the final, which was the first Olympic gold for Gomelsky.

(For some reason, in the last years of Sabonis's mention, he constantly talks about how he ate Robinson for breakfast in those matches, which is simply not true. In the 1986 final, Sabonis scored 16 points with 13 rebounds and four blocks. he scored 20 points, seven rebounds and four blocks, and Robinson scored 23 points with 12 rebounds in the OI final in Seoul, with Sabas 13 and 13.)

Fiorentina John Thompson has probably accelerated the decision to send NBA players to the big contests from America in the future ...

Arvydas has gone abroad for the following year, in Spain, in Valjadolid, of all teams. The forum as it was then called Valladolid, invested a lot of money in basketball and Sabonis was really a top-level transfer. Big deal, but also big problems with injuries. How fragile they have become Sabon's feet, is best said by the fact that he was hurt while he was rushed to answer the phone ...

After three years in Valladolid, Sabonis moved to Real Madrid in another big transfer. He and the Lithuanian roots Joe Arlauckas made the most dominant center line in Europe at that time, and Sabonis played for Real Real Madrid's highest index of usefulness in the history of the Spanish league. Against Ourense in 1995, he scored 32 points (10-15 for two, 2-2 trophies, 6-6 throws), scored 27 rebounds, five blocks, five steals and three assists !! Index was 66, which is still an absolute record. Under the leadership of Zeljko Obradovic, Real Madrid won the last European championship title in Zaragoza. Sabonis broke Olympiacos in the final ... Nineteen years later, Real still waits for the Trophy of the Euroleague. With the Soviet Union's collapse, Arvydas finally got the opportunity he longed for - as a Lithuanian to take part in the Olympics. They reached the semifinals, where Dream Team overtook them, and where Arturas Karnišovas shot from the bench as Jordan slammed over Sabonis.

Resolved that at any cost he won a medal for his country, Sabonis honored the selection that was named as the Union of Independent States (later Russia) with 26 points and 16 rebounds. After the match, Sabas was so excited that he did not even appear at the medal. They found him a couple of days later in the women's section of the Olympic Village ...

After winning all in Europe, finally came the moment that Arvydas tastes even in the NBA and that as the moment he is the oldest debut ever (31 years). "He had everything as a player, except for health," he described Sabonis, a man who knew what severe injuries were, Bill Walton.

At Sabonis and his magic overview of the game, most of the players in the Blazers were not ready.

"I would add the ball to a high post and move in the grid through the racket and then the ball would hit me in the head. I said ... hmmm, from where this gamble is such a review of the game." Rod Strickland took several more balls in the training several times, until he realized that he must always follow what Sabonis is doing when he was attacked. P. Carlesimo gave Arvidas a high-profile game to the entire attacking philosophy. He was a 222cm playmaker."He always liked to spice up his passes, it was rarely a regular dog, always something over his head, behind his back and right in the teammate," said Steve Smith. One of the ridiculous assists was for Kenny Anderson against Clippers, behind the back in the counter, while Sabonis stayed stiff in the position where he added the ball, with a look at his basket and hand behind his back ... Apart from the review of the game, the Blazers were wondering how Sabonis with such injuries manages to move on the ground, but he moved ...

Boss Blazers Paul Allen decided to finally build a team that could attack the title. Pippen, Smith, Stoudamire, Wallace, Grant, Sabonis, Schrempf and Anthony vs. Lakers had 15 differences in the seventh game for 10 minutes to the end and did not endure. It was the closest Sabonis approached the NBA Finals ...

With well-known problems and a bunch of conflicting players, which was impossible to train, the Blazers quickly collapsed. In a bunch of incidents, mutilations, quarrels (Wallace was hitting Sabonis with a towel in the head during a one-time outburst) and arrests, the rest was recorded that Sabas's wife was also arrested for driving in a drunken state. The Blazers simply could not function. Sabonis was farewell to his home club, Žalgiris, from basketball. Each time we say that it is playing much better today than before, that players are bigger athletes and that the defense is incomparably stronger, one thing needs to be remembered.

Arvydas Sabonis was at the age of 40 on the back, wounds, knees and knees destroyed by the MVP of Euroleague in 2004. He literally played recreational and was once again a class for everything ...

And after surviving a heart attack playing basket and becoming president of the basketball federation of Lithuania, he resigned and returned to that position, Sabonis mostly wants to be left alone. Journalists give very rare and mostly extremely short interviews. After all, his speech at the Hall of Fame celebration lasted for 49 seconds ...
At the EP in Slovenia, he brought a complete female part of his family and he constantly frowned watching his team's games, regardless of finals. Every time we met him as he walked through the trails of Kranjska Gora, we felt a sense of awe.

That's how he was with him since teenage days, not just because of the widespread phenomenon, but mostly because of the artistic skill. Sabonis still represents the time when creative players were uncomfortable, and again, only special singles ...