Year after year many top European prospects are leaving the Old Continent and going to the NBA to continue their careers. This summer however will be remembered for the many big guys that have crossed the Atlantic. We did see a more balanced ratio in recent years regarding how many players come and go to America, as European teams managed to bring successful NBA players like Carlos Delfino, Jorge Garbajosa, Juan Carlos Navarro, Nenad Krstic, Linas Kleiza, Josh Childress and others. This trend however seems to be over, mainly because of the raging economic crisis in Europe.
This summer, Europe has seen the likes of Nikola Pekovic (Minnesota Timberwolves), Semih Erden (Boston Celtics), Omer Asik (Chicago Bulls) and Tiago Splitter (San Antonio Spurs) already having agreed with NBA teams while Big Sofo and Sasha Kaun are also on the radar of the LA Clippers and the Cleveland Cavaliers respectively. Big Sofo in particular is already training and playing in the Summer League with the team from L.A.
Fortunately enough, Europe seems to have quite a good production of tall guys that are about to step in for the departing ones. Boban Marjanovic, Miroslav Raduljica, Milan Macvan, Aleks Maric, Ante Tomic, Gasper Vidmar, Mirza Begic, Timofey Mozgov or even Esteban Batista, Ali Traore and Joel Freeland all more than capable of making a difference for the clubs they play for. And there are more coming, just keep an eye open for guys like Leon Radosevic, Darko Planinic, Tomislav Zubcic, Tibor Pleiss, Dejan Musli, Donatas Motiejunas, Mario Delas and you will be well-served.
All in all it always hurts to lose players like Tiago Splitter and Nikola Pekovic, or even Luis Scola, David Andersen and others in the past, but it seems that Europe will always have a nice reserve of big guys.
