When Dirk Nowitzki started playing basketball seriously in his native Würzburg, he was, like all players of his generation, impressed by the trail of dream teamthe legendary Team USA of Barcelona 92 that formed the biggest team ever assembled and in which Nowitzki’s favorite player wore the number 14: Charles Barkley. When he came to the NBA in 1998, he wanted to play with that 14 but he was caught on the Mavericks. Robert Pack, substitute point guard for the Texans, did not release his number and Dirk turned it around: he started playing with the 41, which he did not remove until 2019 and already hanging from the ceiling of the American Airlines Center.
Magic Johnson, the point guard and one of the benchmarks of that dream team, played in Barcelona with the 15, adapting to the FIBA regulations. But he forever remained as the 32nd of the Los Angeles Lakers. A curious case: in high school he wore 32, in College with Michigan State he had to go to 33 because 32 belonged to Greg Kesler, guard and star of the team until the rise of the Magic himself. When he was drafted by the Lakers, however, he was able to return to his 32. The 33, of course, was not an option: it was worn by Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. The other two great myths of a team of myths like the dream team, Larry Bird and Michael Jordan, wore their NBA numbers for their older brothers. Larry’s, Mark, wore 33 at his high school, where he was a standout player. They say that in tribute to Rick Mount, a star before Indiana University and the first high school player to be on the cover of Sports Illustrated. Thus the eternal Larry finished with 33, but not in the Indiana Hoosiers but in the Indiana State Sycamores. And in the Celtics, of course. Forever.
Michael Jordan, for his part, wanted to wear the 45 that his brother Larry had worn. When he got to his team varsity, he chose 23 because it was half his brother’s (he couldn’t wear a 22.5). And he kept it later in North Carolina and Chicago Bulls. In fact, when he played baseball in the NBA’s first retirement (1993-95), he carried 45 of his with the Birmingham Barons. AND when he returned to the NBA he also used the 45 with the Bulls, in 22 games to close the 1994-95 season: “I didn’t want to wear 23 because my father had passed away and he was no longer going to be able to see me with that number. It seemed like a new beginning to me and I returned to the 45 that I had worn in high school.”. In the ’95 playoffs, shortly after he returned to the courts, the Magic eliminated the Bulls and Nick Anderson, forward for the Central Florida team, said his famous “e45 is not like 23″. So Jordan went back to his old number and, with the 23achieved his second threepeat (1996-98). In 1990, and precisely against the Magic, his shirt was stolen and, in a completely exceptional way, he played with the number 12 that game (he scored 49 points). It is believed that it was another fraction. From 45 to 23 and from 23 to another half, 12.
The numbers of the players usually have history. Kevin Durant wore the 35 in Thunder and Warriors as a tribute to his former coach Charles Craig, who marked him deeply in his life and who was assassinated when he was 35 years old. On the Suns he has returned to 35 after wearing 7 on the Brooklyn Netsas he himself said because it was the symbol of the complete work in the Bible: God created the world and rested on the seventh day.
Damian Lillard wears the 0 because it resembles the letter O that has marked his life: He was born in Oakland, played his college stretch at Ogden (with Weber State) and is now with the Blazers (Oregon State). Another 0, however, was chosen for a very different reason: Gilbet Arenas put it on because of those who had said that he would play.”zero minutesin the NBA. he went three times all star and came to sign a contract of 111 million dollars in 2008, with the Wizards. Stephen Curry wears 30 because it was the number of his father, Dell Curry. Grant Hill was wearing 33 at the time of College of Magic and David Robinson, 50 by Ralph Sampson. And Mike Bibby, in another bizarre example, 10 was put because they are the cents that make up the currency that is colloquially known as tell me, a term used in American basketball to refer to assists. The point guard averaged 5.5 in his fourteen years in the NBA.
On the 16th, from Barcelona Memphis and LA
whatand Pau Gasol? Well, the truth is that his number 16, the one who will be retired by the Lakers and who will forever be associated with him in one of the most legendary franchises in all of American sports, does not have much of a narrative behind it. Basically, and as he himself recounted, it was the one that he had to lead by hierarchies and regulations of the time when he arrived at the first team of Barcelona.
“So, the twelve professional records of the teams had to wear the numbers from 4 to 15. Numbers 16 and 17 were left for the youngsters who went up to the first team, who entered if there were injuries… They were the extra numbers. And, when I went up, at Barça they gave me number 16. So, you couldn’t choose. If you were the newcomer, the new one, you couldn’t choose anything”, said the man from Sant Boi, who when he became a definitive member of the first team, he kept the 16 and did not want to choose another minor, because he was doing wonderfully with that: “It had been very successful and that’s why I kept it. It was possible, even if it was as an additional number, so they let me”. On the 16th he accompanied him later in Grizzlies, Lakers, Bulls and Spurs. The three games he played with the Milwaukee Bucks, the last ones in his NBA life, However, he played them with another number, 17. The 16 was retired in homage to Bob Lanier and the 4, by Sidney Moncrief.
The four was his main alternative because it was the number with which he became historic in FIBA basketball, with the Spanish National Team. Just before him, there was Alberto Angulo, who played in Sydney 2000 but was not in the absolute team when Pau debuted, in the 2001 European Championship. Before, with the lower categories, he had worn the 14 (pre-European Under-18 1997 ) and on the 15th, already in the European category and throughout its Sub section, before going on to play with the greater. At 15, therefore, he won the 1999 Junior World Cup against the United States, the great milestone that launched the legend of the Gold Juniors.
When he was going to debut with the absolute, he asked for the 16 that he already had at Barcelona. But FIBA also then had the rule that the twelve players of each team had to wear the numbers between 4 and 15. And there was no extra tricks. So he asked for number 15, which was giving him luck with Spain… but Jorge Garbajosa was wearing it, companion later during so many international battles and now president of the Federation. Pau also scored 14, but it belonged to Alfonso Reyes, the team’s captain at the time. So he finished with the 4, and the rest is the history of Spanish basketball.
