Veteran Bogut says goodbye to basketball
Andrew Bogut, who helped the Warriors win an NBA title and a longtime star in Australia, announced Tuesday morning from his homeland that he was retiring from all levels of professional basketball.
The 36-year-old Bogut had hoped to end his career in the Summer Olympics — first in 2020 before the coronavirus pandemic pushed the Tokyo Games back one year.
“The decision hasn’t been an easy one, but I think it is the right decision,” Bogut said on his Rogues Bogues podcast. “The decision that I made and where I will be signing for next season is absolutely nowhere. I will be retiring from professional basketball, effective immediately.
“We are in late November now. I would have made this decision earlier if it wasn’t for the postponement of the Tokyo Olympics. I was hoping to get to the 2020 Olympics and call it the day after that, as it would have been a great accolade to get a fourth Olympics, but it’s just not meant to be.”
Bogut, part of a controversial trade at the time from Milwaukee to the Warriors for the popular Monta Ellis in March 2012, missed most of 2011– 12 with an ankle injury.
But in the 2014-15 season, Bogut was a key defensive presence and passer from the center position as the Warriors went on to won the NBA championship in 2015, the first of the team’s five consecutive trips to the Finals. He helped the Warriors win an NBA-record 73 games in 2015–16 before they lost in the Finals.
He was then traded to the Dallas Mavericks, where he played briefly before other short stints with the Cleveland Cavaliers and Los Angeles Lakers. In 2018, he returned to his home country to play for the Sydney Kings.
He played parts of 14 NBA seasons and had career averages of 9.6 points and 8.7 rebounds in 706 games (661 starts).
TRAINING CAMPS ARE SET TO OPEN >> For the Los Angeles Lakers and Miami Heat, it was the shortest offseason ever. For the eight teams that haven’t played since March, the offseason dragged for longer than most seasons last. And for all 30 clubs, questions are far more prevalent than answers these days. Ready or not, the NBA is back. Training camps open around the league today, though on- court sessions will be limited to individual workouts and only for those players who have gotten three negative coronavirus test results back in the last few days. Mandatory “group training activities,” another way to describe what would otherwise be called practice, will begin in some cities Friday and for most clubs Sunday, the league said.
Players and coaches will be tested for coronavirus daily around the league, and a positive test at this point would likely derail someone for most of camp and probably into the preseason. Exhibition games are less than two weeks away, starting Dec. 11. The regular season starts on Dec. 22.
Baseball
WOOD-BAT LEAGUE FOR PROSPECTS >> Major League Baseball is creating a minor league for top eligible prospects leading to the summer draft. The wood-bat MLB Draft League is launching with five teams and could add a sixth, MLB said Monday. Teams will play a 68-game regular season that includes an All-Star break that would coincide with the draft in early July.
The season will run roughly from late May through mid-August, broken into halves. The first half will be a showcase for draft- eligible high school, college and junior college players. Following a multiday break for the draft, rosters will be restocked with the best players passed over by MLB teams.
Motorsports
GROSJEAN TO MISS RACE AFTER CRASH, FITTIPALDI’S GRANDSON IN >> Romain Grosjean has been ruled out of the second Formula One race in Bahrain and will be replaced by Pietro Fittipaldi, a grandson of former F1 champion Emerson Fittipaldi, the Haas team said.
Grosjean was hospitalized with burns on the back of both hands after his car collided with a barrier in the Bahrain Grand Prix on Sunday and burst into flames.
Soccer
MIDFIELDER EFRAÍN ÁLVAREZ TO TRAIN WITH U. S. NATIONAL TEAM >> Efraín Álvarez, an LA Galaxy midfielder who started for Mexico in last year’s final of the Under-17 World Cup, was among 22 players called into U.S. training camp for a Dec. 9 exhibition against El Salvador in Fort Lauderdale, Florida.
Álvarez can become eligible to play for the U.S. and would have to apply to FIFA for a one-time switch of association. Eleven of the other 21 players could make U.S. debuts.
Álvarez was born in Los Angeles on June 19, 2002, and played for the U.S. Under-15 team before switching to Mexico’s U-15s.
MLS MOVES SPORTING K.C.- MINNESOTA TO THURSDAY >> Responding to an NFL schedule change and seeing an opportunity to increase viewership, Major League Soccer announced Monday that the Western Conference semifinal game between host Sporting Kansas City and the Minnesota United has been moved from Wednesday to Thursday, and will air at 5 p.m.
The shift follows an NFL schedule change that left Thursday night open on Fox. So, by airing the game on Fox, rather than its FS1 cable affiliate, the soccer game increases its potential viewership. The Baltimore Ravens-Dallas Cowboys game was moved from Thursday to Monday.