Kobe Bryant was one step away from playing in Turkey: what stopped his move to Besiktas? / News - Basketnews.com

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We are watching them in the NBA Finals right now. We see their jerseys hang up in the rafters of the NBA arenas. We remember them as icons and one of the greatest. Giannis Antetokounmpo, Kobe Bryant, and Manu Ginobili set the footprint for their followers worldwide. Throughout their journey, there were some spicy stories, which could have changed their paths to greatness.

Emanuel Ginobili

Position:SGAge:44Height:198 cmWeight:93 kgBirth place:Bahia Blanca, ArgentinaProfileNewsStatistics

BasketNews reminds you of some of the wildest free agency stories.

PART I: Jordan to Estudiantes and Dirk's mystery

Life-changing game for Giannis

The Greek Freak story has been told already. From a street vendor to one of the most dominant NBA players in history. But not many remember that before this fairytale, Giannis Antetokounmpo was officially a player of Zaragoza CAI.

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Back in 2012, Willy Villar, a former Zaragoza sports director, was watching a young 17-year old kid working out in private practice in one of the gyms of Athens. Giannis wore Filathilikos, the second Greek division club, jersey. He had a youth league game against the Panathinaikos U18 team later that day.

It was a confusing workout. As Villar recalled, at first, Antetokounmpo looked more like a prospect for Harlem Globetrotters, not a professional basketball team of ACB League.

"I was extremely nervous," Antetokounmpo recalled that private workout in an interview for Movistar.

He thought it would be a shootaround, but Villar ran him through an almost 90-minute workout. At least that's how he remembers it.

"I was exhausted. When I went back home, I was extremely nervous about the game because I knew that this is a life-changing game for me. If I perform the way I want to perform and he likes me, he might change my and my family's life forever," Antetokounmpo said.

Villar smiles now. As he remembers, it was actually a 50-minute workout. Spanish GM had to stop it because he saw how nervous and tired Giannis was due to all the stress he created in his head.

Giannis Antetokounmpo

MIN:32.71PTS:28.62 (59.84%)REB:11.28As:6.03ST:1.03BL:1.49TO:3.49GM:39ProfileNBA2021/2022

But that game really changed everything. Giannis was first on the floor. He was helping his teammates, playmaking, rebounding... He was all over the place.

"I went there, and I killed it," Giannis recalled in an interview to Movistar. "But for the next two days, I was extremely nervous."

Soon he got a call from his agent, who told Zaragoza is signing him to a four-year deal.

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As El Periodico de Aragon reported, Zaragoza agreed to pay€200k buyout to obtain Antetokounmpo's rights. On December 7 of 2012, one day after Antetokounmpo turned 18, the contract was signed. The only condition was that Giannis had to finish his season in the second Greek division.

"I was delighted, and I was looking forward to going there," Giannis told about the possibility of playing for Zaragoza.

But a few months later, Milwaukee Bucks drafted Giannis with the 15th pick. Although Spaniards hoped Bucks would stash him for one season, he never played a single game for Zaragoza. Giannis' contract with Zaragoza included a $1M NBA buyout. But after all the taxes and calculations, the club received over €300k of profit.

What stopped Kobe from joining Besiktas

Ergin Ataman still dreams of coaching in the NBA one day. But he was really close to coaching one of the best NBA players 10 years ago.

During the NBA lockout in 2011, Ataman and Besiktas Istanbul were trying to persuade Kobe Bryant to come to play to Turkey.

Last winter, Ataman revealed that when Besiktas reached an agreement with Deron Williams in summer 2011, they contacted Kobe Bryant and got a very promising answer from him and his camp.

Credit AP-Scanpix

At that time, Besiktas president Yildirim Demiroren and head of basketball operations Seref Yalcin went to Los Angeles to meet Kobe Bryant.

„Everything was ready. Kobe was almost going to come and play for Besiktas. But problems arose with his sponsorship deals. He wanted to come and play in Turkey," New Agency DHA quoted Ataman in 2020.

According to Yalcin, Turkish Airlines and two oil companies were considered potential sponsors for Kobe's contract. NTV Sport reported that Kobe's expected salary was $1M per month. For example, ESPN The Magazine reported that Williams' deal with Besiktas was worth $5M.

Credit AP – Scanpix

Maybe Kobe didn't play with Besiktas jersey, but at least he tried the rims of Besiktas gym. When he came to Istanbul for a Turkish Airlines commercial in 2012, Kobe expressed his desire to practice. Besiktas opened the gym for him, and Kobe worked out in the arena for a few hours.

The contract detail, which changed the course of Manu

The detail in the contract might have changed Manu Ginobili's course of a glorious career. In 2000, the Argentinian legend had a deal with Olympiacos Piraeus when unexpected circumstances mixed things up.

21 years ago, everything was set. Manu Ginobili was expected to sign with Olympiacos to join Dino Radja, David Rivers, and the others.

"It wasn't like we were close to signing him. It was actually a done deal," former Olympiacos GM Christos Stavropoulos recalls.

Manu was very comfortable with the idea of coming to Piraeus. But his agent Lucciano Capichioni asked to include a small $500k NBA buyout in his contract.

That was a problem. Olympiacos was about to give him $5M for 3 years, which was huge money back then. So Olympiacos president wasn't fascinated by the idea of leaving a possibility of losing such an expensive player so easily.

Meanwhile, some important things were happening in Italy. Virtus Bologna targeted Andrea Meneghin as their key protagonist to turn the organization back on a winning path. However, Meneghin was snapped by their rivals Fortitudo Bologna, who paid $12M for a five-year deal, including a buyout to Varese.

Ettore Messina had to change the direction of building a roster quickly. He thought about a young Argentinian kid who shined in the Italian League playoffs with the Reggio Calabria team.

As Walter Fuochi wrote in his article on La Repubblica, Virtus pulled Manu down from the flight to Athens and Olympiacos.

Eventually, Virtus agreed to put the NBA out clause in Manu's contract, and Ginobili went to Bologna. Two years later, Spurs bought out Ginobili. The rest is history.

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