Michael Olowokandi
Michael Olowokandi is a British-Nigerian former professional basketball player. Born in Lagos, Nigeria and raised in London, he played collegiately for the Pacific Tigers. Olokowandi was selected as the first pick in the 1998 NBA draft by the Los Angeles Clippers. He played professionally until 2007, when he was forced to retire due to severe hernia and knee injuries.
Due to his underwhelming career he is considered one of the biggest draft busts in NBA history.
Early years
Olowokandi was born in Lagos, Nigeria; his father was a diplomat. His family moved to London when he was 4. Olowokandi attended the Newlands Manor School in Seaford, East Sussex, where he set British age group records in long jump and triple jump and also played center midfield in football.Olowokandi had a height of 6'8 at age 16, growing six inches in two years. He first touched a basketball at the age of 17, and began playing basketball when he was 18.
Olowokandi then entered Brunel University as a mechanical engineering major, where he was an athlete in track and field, cricket, and rugby union. He had a tryout with the Thames Valley Tigers of the Budweiser Basketball League but did not receive a contract.
College career
In 1995, on Olowokandi's 20th birthday, he opened the Peterson's Guide to American Colleges and Universities and found the school page of University of the Pacific. Olowokandi then called the UOP basketball office in hopes that he would be accepted to play basketball. After being informed that there were no more available basketball scholarships in UOP, Olowokandi offered to pay for his schooling for two years. He started out in a poor basketball condition but eventually became a star for the team, averaging a team high 12.6 points, 7.4 rebounds and 1.9 blocks.During his junior year, he led his team to the 1997 NCAA Tournament and as a senior he led the Tigers to the 1998 National Invitation Tournament. He averaged 22 points, 11 rebounds, and 3 blocks per game his senior year and was the 1997–98 Big West Conference Player of the Year. He graduated from Pacific with a degree in Economics and had his No. 55 jersey retired by the university in 1998.
Professional career
Olowokandi was considered to be a top two pick in the 1998 NBA draft due to his wingspan and "unlimited upside". He was drafted with the first overall pick by the Los Angeles Clippers. The start of the 1998–99 NBA season was hampered due to a lockout and Olokowandi signed with Italian team Kinder Bologna on 5 January 1999 – only two days before the lockout was resolved. In 3 regular season Italian League games played with Bologna, he averaged 4.7 points, 5.7 rebounds and 0.3 assists in 17.3 minutes per game. He also played for 3 games in the FIBA EuroLeague, where he averaged 10.7 points, 6.0 rebounds and 0.3 assists in 21.3 minutes per game. Bologna granted Olowokandi an early release to sign with the Clippers as he did not have a considerable impact and was poorly conditioned. Olowokandi claimed that he felt misused by the team and did not have his offensive abilities utilised.Olowokandi signed with the Clippers on January 29, 1999. Olowokandi averaged 9.9 points, 8.0 rebounds and 1.6 blocked shots in 30.4 minutes per game in a 323 game stint for five seasons with the Clippers. Clippers assistant coach Kareem Abdul-Jabbar considered Olowokandi "talented but uncoachable" and cited his lack of willingness to accept criticism in practice as being detrimental to his career.
Afterwards, Olowokandi signed as an unrestricted free agent with the Minnesota Timberwolves for the 2003–04 NBA season. On 26 January 2006, he was traded to the Boston Celtics in a multi-player trade.
In 500 regular season NBA games, Olowokandi averaged 8.3 points, 6.8 rebounds, and 1.39 blocked shots per game. In 15 playoff games, he averaged 2.1 points, 3.5 rebounds, and.7 blocks per game. In the 2001–2002 season, Olowokandi saw the most playing time of his career and averaged 11.1 points and 8.8 rebounds. During the last 20 games of that season, he averaged 17 points a game and 11 rebounds, and was considered one of the biggest free agents in the 2002–2003 free agency class.
Before his injuries occurred due to overtraining, Olowokandi was noted for his large size and skills with scoring, blocking shots, and rebounding, readily helping the Clippers against top NBA defenders such Dikembe Mutombo. Out of 20 top free agents in 2003, Olowokandi was the 4th most valuable free agent prior to his injury.
In 2002, Olowokandi was the first choice to be signed by the San Antonio Spurs to replace Hall of Famer David Robinson. He was also a top choice for the Denver Nuggets, with Kiki VanDeWeghe of the Denver Nuggets considering Olowokandi to be a "legitimate center." Eventually, due to financial issues with the L.A. Clippers, Olowokandi left the Clippers to join the Minnesota Timberwolves in 2003.
During the 2002-03 season, Olowokandi's performance was not as strong when he began to experience severe tendonitis in his left knee, which eventually required surgical treatment as he was forced to miss out on the final 2.5 months of the season. Despite facing injuries that had been unsuccessfully treated, he continued to play dozens of games for the L.A. Clippers, Minnesota Timberwolves, and finally the Boston Celtics before finally retiring in 2007. In 2009, he received hernioplasty treatment in Munich, Germany.
Charity
In 2001, Olowokandi and his Clippers teammates participated in the BasketBowl Challenge at Keystone Lanes in Norwalk, to raise funds for the Los Angeles Clippers Foundation and Children's Hospital Los Angeles.During Thanksgiving of 2006, Olowokandi volunteered his time at the Boston Children's Hospital and served meals for over 200 homeless people at the Pine Street Inn in Boston. He has also donated to various charities and hospitals, including over $100,000 to the Children's Hospital Los Angeles for a new incubator for premature newborn infants. Many of Olowokandi's charitable projects were undisclosed and done privately without his teams' affiliations.