Andrew Bogut

Andrew Michael Bogut (born 28 November 1984) is an Australian former professional basketball player who spent the majority of his career in the National Basketball Association (NBA). The tall center was selected by the Milwaukee Bucks with the first overall pick in the 2005 NBA draft. He earned All-NBA Third Team honors with the Bucks in 2010. He was traded to the Golden State Warriors in 2012, and was named NBA All-Defensive Second Team in 2015, when he won an NBA championship with the Warriors. Bogut played college basketball for two years with the Utah Utes, and earned national player of the year honors in 2005. He declared for the NBA draft, and became the first Australian to be the NBA's first overall pick. In his first year with the Bucks, Bogut was named to the NBA All-Rookie First Team in 2006. He earned all-league honors in 2010 after averaging a career-high 15.9 points along with 10.2 rebounds per game. He missed most of 2011–12 with an ankle injury, when he was traded to Golden State. After the Warriors won the NBA Finals in 2015, Bogut helped the Warriors win an NBA-record 73 games in 2015–16. He was traded to the Dallas Mavericks, where he played briefly before other short stints with the Cleveland Cavaliers and Los Angeles Lakers. In 2018, he returned to his home country to play for the Sydney Kings of the National Basketball League (NBL) and won the NBL MVP honours. Following the 2018–19 NBL season, Bogut signed back with the Warriors. He then returned to the Kings for a second season before retiring in 2020. Described as one of the leading faces of Australian basketball, Bogut has been credited for serving as a cornerstone of the Australian national team, for paving the way for an entire generation of Australian players in the NBA and in playing a leading role in re-vitalising the Australian NBL. Early life Bogut was born in Melbourne in 1984. His parents, Michael and Anne, immigrated to Australia from Croatia in the 1970s, with his father from Osijek and his mother from Karlovac. Bogut grew up playing Australian rules football and tennis in addition to basketball. As a child, he patterned his basketball game after Toni Kukoč, a Croatian NBA player who spent the majority of the 1990s playing for the Chicago Bulls. As a 15-year-old, he was cut from the Victoria junior state representative team. In response to this setback, Bogut began to improve his game with the help of Siniša Marković, a professional basketball player from Yugoslavia.