By RUSSELL BENNETT
FROM promising Endeavour Hills youngster to starting centre on arguably the best team in the NBA.
It’s sure been a whirlwind journey for Andrew Bogut in his basketball career so far.
The former first overall draft pick finally seems to have shed the mountain of bad luck that followed him around and caused no end of injury concerns over recent years.
It wouldn’t be accurate to call him injury-prone, like many believe he is, because almost all of the injuries he has sustained so far have been from freak occurrences.
But now that he’s back healthy, he’s earning high praise from some of the most respected basketball pundits in the United States.
The 29-year-old seven-footer is not only being classed as one of the NBA’s best frontcourt defenders, many are saying his increased role in the Golden State offence under new coach Steve Kerr has been the key factor in the team’s 5-1 start to the season.
Kirk Goldsberry, in an article for the acclaimed Grantland website started by ESPN journalist Bill Simmons, described just how enamoured Kerr is with Bogut’s passing game in particular.
“In the preseason, Kerr lauded Andrew Bogut’s abilities as a passer and discussed how Bogut will help the new-look offense,” Goldsberry said, referring to an NBA.com story by Antonio Gonzalez in which Kerr was quoted as saying: “Andrew’s one of the best passing centres in the league. He’s one of the best I’ve ever seen, and so for us to get him the ball on the elbows as a dribble-handoff guy, backdoor-pass guy, that will be emphasised.”
Kerr, it should be noted, won five NBA championships as a player and played alongside some of the best passing big men to play the game.
Bogut is currently averaging 6.5 points, 11.2 rebounds, and 2.2 blocks per game. He is in the top five in the NBA in both rebounding a blocked shots and heads the league in other key defensive categories.
