Eaton went undrafted out of Oklahoma State because he didn’t have NBA talent. He joined the D-League and was assigned to the Tulsa 66ers, but he played in only 2 games, totalling 1 point, 1 assists and 5 turnovers. Tulsa then released him in December. The fact that he’s 5’10 and 260lbs might be why.
Former Timberwolves draft pick Ebi spent last year in Italy’s Serie A, but this year downgraded to Lega Due, the division below. (Why Lega Due is not called Serie B, I do not know.) The obvious benefit there is to Ebi’s numbers, and he’s responded with averages of 16.1 points, 13.4 rebounds, 3.1 steals, 1.4 blocks and 1.3 assists per game. He leads Rimini in rebounds (with no one else having more than 4.5), steals and blocks, and is second in points only to Carlton Myers.
Carlton Myers used to be one of the best scorers in Italy, averaging over 20ppg in Serie A for about 26 years. Myers has played all but 7 games of his 19 year career in Italy and turns 39 in late March, so he’s a long way out of his prime, but even at this ripe old age he is scoring a very efficient 17 ppg at a decent standard of basketball. This is not comparable to his best, though, for Carlton Myers once scored 87 points in a Serie A game. This occurred as recently as 1995, and here’s a, uh, really awkward video of some of it.
Carlton Myers is pretty much an Italian, despite the name, being born to an Italian mother and spending basically his whole life there. However, he was born in London, as was Ndudi Ebi. Rimini also boast another Englishman, Mike Bernard, a former South Florida bench player and English international. Because of this trio, Basket Crabs Rimini are my favourite Italian second division team. Also factoring into that decision is the fact that their name is Crabs Rimini.
Former Sacramento Kings draft pick Corsley Edwards is in China….or he was, until he broke his finger this week and returned home. On the season, Edwards is averaging 29.3 points, 8.3 points and 2.7 assists in 39 minutes per game, shooting 55% from the field, 69% from three-point range (somehow) and 78% from the line. Included in there was a 50 point outing and a 47 point outing, and in 15 games he never scored less than 20. Pretty good, Corsley. Pretty good.
John Edwards spent two years in the NBA. He signed as an undrafted free agent out of Kent State with the Pacers in 2004, played spot minutes in 25 games, and then the Hawks signed him to a two year, $2.08 million contract in the summer of 2005. After one year with Atlanta – in which he totalled 70 points, 48 rebounds and 76 fouls – the Hawks traded him back to the Pacers as filler in the Al Harrington deal. The Pacers then waived him, and after a training camp contract with the Timberwolves in 2007, that was it for John Edwards in the NBA.
Edwards has spent two of the last three years in the D-League, seemingly aware that the knock on him is his “rawness.” Last year for the Sioux Falls Skyforce, he averaged 9.3 and 6.9 rebounds in 21 minutes per game, solid if sedate numbers for a centre-starved league. Those numbers are particularly sedate though when you consider that Edwards is now 28 years old. You can’t be raw forever.
He did not initially return to the D-League this year, instead signing with Kolossos Rhodes in Greek’s A1 League. In theory, he was going to provide an NBA-calibre frontcourt along with recent Heat draft pick, Robert Ntoziep. In practice, though, he was not very successful. Edwards played only 36 minutes on the entire season, totalling 12 points, 5 rebounds and 8 fouls. Kolossos then waived him and signed David Monds as his replacement.
This was only the second time in his career that John Edwards has signed outside of America, and after his release he returned to what he knows best, joining the Bakersfield Jam of the D-League. In five games, Edwards is averaging 7.2 points, 4.4 rebounds, 4.0 fouls and 1.8 turnovers per game. He’s the same player that he ever was. And therein lies the problem.
After being sufficiently incredible enough to win the EuroCup single-handedly (kind of) for Lietuvos Rytas last season, Eidson went where the money was and signed for Maccabi Tel-Aviv. In the Israeli league, he is averaging 10.2 points, 3.7 rebounds and 3.5 assists per game, alongside 13.1 points, 4.5 rebounds and 2.8 assists per game in the EuroLeague. Maccabi fans kind of hate him at times, but then again, Maccabi fans kind of hate everything at times.
This time last year, Eisley was working for the Nets for free as a “coaching associate”, which is basically a player development coach. Having no evidence to the contrary, I am going to assume that he’s still there.
Former Maryland and Atlanta Hawks big man Ekezie last played in April 2007. In February 2008 he established a new online venture called ZeepTravel, with the aims of being Nigeria’s primary travel portal. Here is Ekezie talking about it.
Drexel offshoot Elegar, who made his name with a strong showing at the Portsmouth Invitational in 2008, is signed in Turkey. Playing for Bornova, The Elegarnce averages 12.5 points, 7.1 rebounds and 1.5 blocks per game.
Elegar has a teammate called Ihsan Yalcin Azizmahmutogullari. An anagram of that is oh shut up.
Before Omri Casspi came Lior Eliyahu. Yahoo, an athletic Israeli forward whose rights are owned by the Houston Rockets, left his native Israel this summer and joined Caja Laboral in Spain. The side effect of that has been a dramatic decline in playing time; Eliyahu averages 17.9 minutes per game in the EuroLeague, but only 12.8 minutes per game in the ACB. He averages 7.1/3.6 in the EuroLeague and 4.4/1.8 in the ACB.
George Washington product Elliott spent the first two years of his previous career with the Sioux Falls Skyforce and Fort Wayne Mad Ants of the D-League. This summer, however, he gave it all up and moved abroad, to the basketball hotbed that is Finland. I’m not up to date on the salary structure of Finnish basketball, nor am I even out of date with it, but I can’t imagine it pays a whole lot better than the D-League. And the standard isn’t better.
Elliott is playing for the deliciously named Honka Playboys, the team better known for producing Petteri Koponen. He is averaging 17.9 points, 4.4 rebounds, 2.8 assists and 2.7 steals per game, shooting 50% from the field and 26% from three point range.
Another Skyforce ex, Ellis started the year in Uruguay playing for a team called Union Atletica, where he paired up with former NBA player Art Long. Ellis averaged 11.7 points and 8.6 rebounds in seven games; Long is averaging 15.4/9.9 through 14. Ellis has since moved to the Ukraine, which is about as far away from Uruguay as you can get geographically, if not alphabetically. He has played one game for his new team, Dnipro, totalling 2 points, 6 rebounds and 3 turnovers.
Tyrone Ellis, Southern Nazarene’s finest, is spending his third season with Cajasol Sevilla in Spain’s ACB. He is averaging 11.3 points and not much else on the season, shooting 42% from the field and 40% from three point range. Ellis takes six three-pointers a game, which gives you some idea of his role on the team.
Ellis holds a Georgian passport, one obtained through those hitherto unexplained means that sometimes seem to befall decent American players in Europe. [Georgia is a country, by the way. Zaza Pachulia plays for them.] Another American-Georgian passport holder is Shammond Williams; both Ellis and Williams have had the common decency to at play for the national team of the country whose generous gift of a passport greatly enhanced their basketball careers. That’s the way it should be, Dan Dickau.
