Arvydas Sabonis

• 1. Introduction

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  Arvydas Sabonis was selected by the Portland Trail Blazers in the first round of the 1986 NBA draft, but he would not step onto an NBA court until 1995 - nine years later, at the age of 30. By then, he had already won a gold medal at the Olympics, suffered multiple devastating injuries, and carried his country through some of the most turbulent years in modern European history. The question that hung over his entire NBA career - what might have been - is one that teammates, analysts, and fans still argue about today. How did a center described as "a point guard in a center's body" end up spending his prime years thousands of miles from the league that wanted him?

• 2. From Kaunas to the World Stage

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  Sabonis was born on the 19th of December 1964 in Kaunas, then part of the Soviet Union. He picked up a basketball at age 13, and the trajectory was steep: by 15, he had already earned a spot on the Soviet national junior team. He made his professional club debut in 1981 with Zalgiris, one of the oldest basketball clubs in Lithuania, right in his hometown. With Zalgiris, he won three consecutive Soviet Premier League titles. He also won the 1986 FIBA Club World Cup, known then as the FIBA Intercontinental Cup.

  The Soviet basketball system gave Sabonis a world stage early, but it also consumed him. In 1982, still a teenager, he was part of the Soviet senior national team that toured the United States, playing college basketball programs. That same year he helped the Soviets win gold at the FIBA World Championship. Gold at the 1985 EuroBasket followed, where Sabonis was also named the tournament's MVP.

  The intensity of that schedule, combined with the Cold War rivalry between Zalgiris Kaunas and CSKA Moscow in the USSR Premier League, meant injuries were not given time to heal. Sabonis himself said in a 2011 interview that overuse by Soviet national program coaches was a major contributing factor to the Achilles tendon injury he first suffered in 1986. He was not yet 22 years old.

• 3. The Injury and the Draft

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  Atlanta Hawks originally selected Sabonis with the 77th overall pick of the 1985 NBA draft, but the selection was voided because he was under 21 at the time. The following spring, his Achilles tendon gave way. Portland Trail Blazers took him anyway, with the 24th overall pick in the 1986 draft.

  LSU Tigers head coach Dale Brown even offered Sabonis a spot at Louisiana State University, which would have preserved his amateur status for Olympic competition, but Soviet authorities refused to let him play in the United States at all. What the Soviets did permit was a trip to Portland in 1988, ostensibly to rehabilitate with the Blazers medical staff, and Sabonis practiced with the team during that visit.

  The rehabilitation itself became a flashpoint. When Sabonis had a surgical Achilles procedure performed in Portland in 1988, the USSR Olympic team called him back before he had fully recovered. The Portland medical staff protested the decision at the time. The Soviets played a limping Sabonis in the 1988 Summer Olympics in South Korea anyway. Portland general manager Bob Whitsitt, describing Sabonis's X-rays to a 2011 interviewer, recalled the team physician's verdict: "He said that Arvydas could qualify for a handicapped parking spot, based on the X-ray alone."

• 4. Seoul 1988 and Soviet Gold

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  Despite arriving at the 1988 Seoul Olympics less than fully fit, Sabonis led the Soviet Union to a gold medal. In the semifinals, the Soviets defeated the United States team that included future NBA All-Stars David Robinson, Mitch Richmond, and Danny Manning. That American squad was the last U.S. Olympic basketball team not composed of active NBA players. The Soviets then beat Yugoslavia in the final.

  For Sabonis, the gold came at a cost he would spend the rest of his career paying. The chronic knee, ankle, and groin problems that substantially limited his mobility and explosiveness by the mid-1990s traced directly to the heavy playing schedule of those years and the decisions made about his recovery. When his Soviet national teammate Sarunas Marciulionis went to North America, Sabonis stayed behind, feeling he was not physically ready for the NBA. He was right to be cautious. The body that arrived in Portland in 1995 was not the one the Blazers had drafted.

• 5. European Prime

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  While Portland waited, Sabonis built a second career in Europe. In 1989 he signed with the Spanish Liga ACB club Forum Valladolid, helping the team reach the semifinals of the Korac Cup during the 1991-92 season. His younger son Tautvydas was born in Valladolid during those years.

  In 1992 Sabonis moved to Real Madrid, where his numbers climbed to levels that made the NBA question whether they had misjudged the situation. During the 1994-95 Spanish League season, he averaged 22.9 points, 12.5 rebounds, 2.4 assists, 1.6 steals, and 2.3 blocked shots across 42 games. In the 1994-95 FIBA European League season he averaged 21.8 points and 11.2 rebounds in 17 games. Real Madrid won the EuroLeague title in 1994-95, and Sabonis was voted the EuroLeague Final Four MVP that year. He had also been voted EuroLeague Player of the Year in 1993. He won those two EuroLeague Player of the Year awards and two Spanish League titles with Real Madrid before the Blazers finally came calling again after the 1994-95 season.

• 6. Portland: The Ghost of What Could Have Been

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  His rookie NBA campaign, at 30, was remarkable given the X-rays. Sabonis averaged 14.5 points on 55 percent shooting and 8.1 rebounds per game while playing less than 24 minutes a night. He was named to the All-Rookie First Team and finished runner-up in both Rookie of the Year and Sixth Man of the Year voting. In the playoffs that first year, his averages jumped to 23.6 points and 10.2 rebounds per game, even as Portland lost to Utah in five games. His career-best regular season came in 1997-98: 16.0 points, 10.0 rebounds, and 3.0 assists per game.

  The Blazers made the playoffs every season Sabonis was there during his first stint, as part of a 21-year postseason streak. After six consecutive first-round exits, Portland rebuilt between 1998 and 1999, trading Kenny Anderson and Isaiah Rider for Damon Stoudamire and Steve Smith, keeping Sabonis as the only starter. They reached the Western Conference Finals in both 1999 and 2000. In 1999 the San Antonio Spurs swept them. In 2000 a starting lineup of Sabonis, Steve Smith, Stoudamire, Rasheed Wallace, and Scottie Pippen fell to the Los Angeles Lakers in seven games, at the beginning of the Lakers' three-peat.

  The counterfactual haunts the record books. Clyde Drexler, his teammate and a Hall of Famer himself, said the Trail Blazers would "have had four, five or six titles" if Sabonis had arrived in his prime. "Guaranteed. He was that good. He could pass, shoot three pointers, had a great post game, and dominated the paint." ESPN's David Thorpe put it differently: Sabonis would have been the best passing big man in NBA history, and possibly a top-four center overall. NBA.com's Erik Lyslo described him as "a point guard in a center's body" and added that his court savvy aged better than pure athleticism ever could.

  On the 6th of April 2001, Sabonis scored a season-high 32 points while hitting 11 of 12 field goal attempts in a 122-91 win over the Golden State Warriors. After that season he told the Blazers he was done, saying in his own words he "was tired mentally and physically." He briefly signed a nominal-salary deal with Zalgiris Kaunas expecting to play late-season games, but ended up missing that entire season recovering from injuries. He returned to Portland for one final season in 2002-03, then closed his professional playing career with one last year at Zalgiris in 2003-04, where he led the team to the EuroLeague Top 16 stage and was named both the Group Stage MVP and the Top 16 Stage MVP. He officially retired from professional basketball in 2005.

• 7. Lithuania, Legacy, and Family

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  After the Soviet Union dissolved and Lithuania regained independence, Sabonis joined the Lithuanian national team and won bronze medals at both the 1992 Summer Olympics in Barcelona and the 1996 Summer Olympics. His journey to represent Lithuania at Barcelona is the subject of the documentary film The Other Dream Team, which premiered at the Sundance Film Festival in 2012 and was distributed by Lionsgate in the United States and Disney internationally.

  On the 20th of August 2010, Sabonis was inducted into the FIBA Hall of Fame. On the 12th of August 2011 he was enshrined in the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame, having been named to it on the 4th of April of that year. On the 24th of October 2011 he was voted President of the Lithuanian Basketball Federation, replacing Vladas Garastas, who had led the federation since 1991. He resigned on the 2nd of October 2013 and returned eight days later, on the 10th of October.

  Sabonis is married to Ingrida Mikelionyte, the first Miss Lithuania, a fashion model and film actress. His son Tautvydas was born in Valladolid, and his son Domantas was born in Portland. Domantas was selected 11th overall in the 2016 NBA draft and has become a three-time NBA All-Star with the Sacramento Kings. In September 2011, Sabonis suffered a heart attack while playing basketball in Lithuania; doctors described it as not life-threatening. According to Domantas, his father is a devoted fan of the Boston Celtics, with Larry Bird as his favorite player and green his favorite color.