Manu Ginobili announces his retirement

August 27th, 2018

After a couple of months of deliberation, San Antonio Spurs guard Manu Ginobili today announced his retirement. In a tweet sent out this evening, Ginobili said; “Today, with a wide range of feelings, I’m announcing my retirement from basketball.” Ginobili had been working out with the Spurs in the offseason, testing his body to see if he would want and be able to play to play one final season with the team. Now, it is clear that he won’t. Ginobili is calling time on a professional playing career that goes back 23 years, the last 16 of which have been spent in the NBA with the Spurs. Drafted with the penultimate pick of the 1999 NBA Draft, Ginobili’s success as a player predated his time in the NBA; he won a Euroleague title in 2001 with Kinder Bologna, leading the Finals in scoring along the way and being named Finals MVP, and also won consecutive Italian League MVP titles in 2001 and 2002, before leaving to join the NBA. Manu also had plenty of success on the international level, too. He was the leader of the Argentina team that won the silver medal in the World Championships back in 2002, and was the leading scorer on the subsequent 2004 Olympic team that beat the United States in the semi-finals, went on to win the gold medal, and ended the American dominance of the international game. It was in San Antonio, though, where he had his greatest success. The trio of Manu, Tony Parker and Tim Duncan were the foundations of a dynastic run for the Spurs that featured a 14 consecutive playoff-season run that continues to this day, that featured four NBA Championship wins in that time. During this reign, the Spurs were venerated for their consistent success, and about how they […]