While he has been struggling since his last NBA freelance with the Los Angeles Lakers in 2019, Michael Beasley will play next season in China, with the Shanghai Sharks. The dream of a return to the NBA is moving away for the winger, but he will be able to try to revive a career almost at a standstill for a few years.
He will have tried everything to come back, but the NBA will never have given him another chance. Big prospect when he arrived in the League in 2008 (selected in 2nd position in the Draft by Miami), Michael Beasley falls into the category of many players who have not had the career expected of them. Despite a few promising first seasons, the former Kansas State Wildcat will see his career take several bad turns. Selected in the NBA All-Rookie First Team following a first season with almost 14 points on average (47% of address, 40.7% at 3-pointers), he was transferred by the Heat to Wolves to make room for the LeBron James-Dwyane Wade-Chris Bosh trio. A trade in Minnesota that will allow Michael to explode and achieve what is still his best statistical season: in a very weak team, the guy will put down 19.2 points every night, with 5.6 rebounds and 2.1 assists. With some pretty little spikes in scoring, as in an evening in November 2010 during which he will stick 42 points on the truffle of the Kings. A third pro season that will not be confirmed, and the problems will begin for Beasley. Transferred to the Phoenix Suns following a disappointing second season in Minneapolis, he will be cut the following offseason following an arrest for possession of narcotics. The Heat offered him a second chance and he played two seasons there off the bench, but he hardly played in the 2014 Playoffs campaign, which ended in failure in the Finals once morest Spurs. In the summer of 2015, the doors of the NBA closed and Beasley went into exile in China, where he was a hit, before being recalled to the NBA by Houston. After more or less successful stints in Milwaukee, New York and Los Angeles, Michael was traded by the Lakers to the Clippers, then cut in stride before ending the season with the Southern Tigers of Guangdong, China. The winger doesn’t know it yet, but he won’t be returning to the NBA.
Sources: Former NBA No. 2 pick Michael Beasley is returning to professional basketball and will sign a seven-figure deal with the Shanghai Sharks of the Chinese Basketball Association.
— Shams Charania (@ShamsCharania) June 5, 2022
A COVID pandemic and two contracts signed then aborted at the Detroit Pistons and the Brooklyn Nets later, the NBA seems far away for Michael Beasley. Without an interesting proposal, the former big prospect finally finds himself in the Puerto Rican league by joining JJ Barea’s Cangrejeros de Santurce for the 2020-21 season. A very short adventure of two small matches, then nothing… until today. Long months particularly difficult to live for the player, who confided in the podcast The Pivot on the periods of depression that have crossed his career. But the player clings to his dream of returning to the NBA. Despite all his efforts and several participations in the Summer League in the summer of 2021, nothing will be offered to him. Surely tired of waiting, Beasley finally accepted the Shanghai Sharks’ offer for 2022-23. In China, a nice contract worth more than a million dollars awaits him.
Nothing has been easy in Michael Beasley’s career. Between arrests for possession of illegal products, periods of depression and exiles to revive himself, the man has gone through many hardships but has never given up. At 33, he will be able to relaunch his career. To scratch a last freelance in the NBA? The next few months will tell.
Sources texte : Hoopsrumors / Twitter : @ShamsCharania
