 Don't cry for him, Argentina
By Luke T. Johnson (China Daily)
Updated: 2008-07-11 10:01 Few basketball players are as equipped for an international tournament like the Olympics as Argentina's Fabricio Oberto. In his more than 15 years of playing professionally, Oberto - a dual citizen of Argentina and Italy - has won titles on three continents. He won a slew of them with legendary Argentina National League side Atenas between 1993 and 1998, another couple with TAU Ceramica in the Spanish ACB league, and one in 2007 with his current NBA club the San Antonio Spurs. But none of those are quite as sweet as the gold medal he won with the Argentine national team at the Athens Olympics in 2004. "It was one of the most wonderful feelings I've had along my career," Oberto said on his website (www.fabrioberto.com) about winning the Olympic gold medal. Oberto will come to Beijing next month to help Argentina defend its gold in what could be one of his last appearances for the national team. At 33, Oberto is no longer the sprightly athlete he was when he first donned the jersey of Atenas at 17. After years of grueling club and international competition - and having seen younger Argentina teammates like Pepe Sanchez (31) and Walter Hermann (29) retire from the national side earlier this year - Oberto is no doubt considering the merits of Argentina's youth movement. But there is still plenty left in the tank for the man who with 70 international appearances is one of Argentina's most capped players. The longest-tenured member of Argentina's current roster will once again man the middle for his homeland in what promises to be one of the most competitive Olympic basketball tournaments in history. Oberto comes from a small agricultural town in Argentina's flatlands called Las Varillas, located some 140 km southeast of Cordoba. The town sits in the heart of a soccer-mad nation, a rather unlikely place to produce an Olympic basketball gold medalist. But Oberto, who has himself admitted that he was "really, really bad" at soccer growing up, has dreamed of rubbing shoulders with legends of the hardcourt since he was a skinny 7-year-old shooting hoops made of hanging chain-link nets. "I was always the tallest in the line at school," the 2.08 m center said. "Whenever I had free time, I spent all day playing on the basketball court." He first had the chance to play with Atenas in a trial at a provincial tournament in 1993. He was soon asked to join the club full time and quickly became a starter. The opening match of the 1993-94 season against cross-town rival Ferro was a game Oberto will never forget. "It was the first time I shared a basketball court with my great idol Marcelo Milanesio. Apart from the coaches, it was Marcelo who helped me improve my technique," he said. After several successful years with Atenas, Oberto decided in 1998 to try his luck in Europe and signed with reigning European champion Olympiakos Greece. It was the beginning of what would be a very difficult year for him. "It was hard for me to fit into a team full of European stars," he said. "In addition, it wasn't easy for me to become a member of the Greek society and I didn't have any fellow countryman, neither in the team nor in the city." Olympiakos made it to the league final that year but Oberto missed the game after breaking his hand bumping into a teammate while warming up for the league semifinal. After just one season in Greece, he resigned from the team believing he had a chance to fulfill a life-long dream of playing in the NBA. But his tryout with the New York Knicks in 1999 ended in bitter disappointment, a day he said was one of the worst of his professional career. He spent the next five seasons in the Spanish league, polishing his game and rediscovering his passion. Then in 2005, just months after his daughter Julia was born, Oberto fulfilled what he calls "one of my most important dreams" and signed with the NBA's San Antonio Spurs where he now plays alongside Argentina teammate Manu Ginobili. Oberto saw little action during his first year in San Antonio, playing less than nine minutes a game. But he was right where he wanted to be and knew if he stayed positive his time would come. Sure enough, in the 2007 NBA Playoffs, Oberto was thrust into the starting lineup and his rebounding and defense were instrumental in the Spurs winning the championship that year. Oberto, nicknamed "Fabio", may not be the prettiest player on the court and his contributions go largely unheralded. But he is the kind of gritty, hard-nosed and intelligent player indispensable to championship teams. As Spurs coach Gregg Popovich told the San Antonio Express-News in 2006: "He's the most productive ugly player I've ever seen. He looks like a bull in a china shop out there, but he sets good picks, rebounds his fanny off and makes great passes. He just knows how to play." (China Daily 07/11/2008 page14) |
