Delfino: «In the NBA, I was told we stole what was theirs in Athens 2004» | OneFootball

From being drafted by the reigning champion alongside LeBron James to reaching the NBA with the gold medal from Athens. Cabeza looked back on his decorated career with BOLAVIP and spoke about the league today, where he continues to make headlines in his role as a commentator.

Nine years, four teams, and more than 500 NBA games over the course of his career. The first Argentine rookie ever selected in the first round of the Draft, no less than in the historic 2003 class that brought LeBron James, Darko Milicic, Dwyane Wade, Carmelo Anthony, Chris Bosh and many others into the league.

He arrived in the NBA after one of the greatest feats in the history of Argentine sports, with that gold medal at the 2004 Athens Olympic Games, where the national team knocked off the United States Dream Team.

He says that arriving in the world’s top league under those circumstances earned him a different level of respect, and that to this day he still receives recognition over there while working from the broadcast booth.

In an exclusive interview with BOLAVIP, Carlos Delfino looked back on his playing career, with special emphasis on Argentina, the decade he spent in the NBA, and the current state of the league, which he now experiences daily in his new role as a commentator for TNT Sports and HBO Max, a job he debuted in an arena during this season’s Western Conference finals between the Oklahoma City Thunder and San Antonio Spurs.

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-What a game you got for your debut in this role, huh…

-Unbelievable, I got an absolutely incredible game (Editor’s note: SAS beat OKC 122-115 in double OT). We came to cover a series we knew was going to be fun and intense, and it delivered from the start. What we didn’t expect was that much back-and-forth; I honestly ended up exhausted, like I’d played in it myself, haha.

-What was it like seeing Victor Wembanyama live?

-Wemby is a beast from another planet, physically on a whole different level... Honestly, watching how he plays, how he controls the court, his teammates, and his opponents... how he changes everything that’s normally done. It’s overwhelming, because you see him on TV and say, “Yeah, he must be big,” but when you watch him move with that height and that fluidity, you realize why he’s so special. Against OKC, he’s showing it. Playing at this level with so little experience and doing it the way he did sends one hell of a message.

-You shared the court, as both rival and teammate, with great players. You had Giannis on the roster in Milwaukee; you played against LeBron, against Kobe, with Manu both ways. Do you think Wemby has the tools to become that kind of all-time player?

-I think he’s already doing something historic. We’ve crossed paths with a lot of players who made their own way, but with Wemby... if he stays healthy and keeps growing, I don’t see any limits. He’s very different, he changes the game a lot, and he’s a game-changer for his team. We’re talking about a very young kid. In Game 1, his stat line was incredible, but what’s also striking is how he controls the pace: that pull-up three in transition, how fearless he was at the end, how he closed out overtime. Youth gives you that fearlessness, but he also physically dominates at a level that, compared to Kobe, LeBron, or Giannis when they were young, they didn’t have that kind of early dominance—they developed it later. Wemby is elastic, tall, alters shots, changes dynamics and geometry on the floor. It’s really impressive.

-The game keeps changing and evolving. Now I get the “easy” part of watching and analyzing the game from the outside. We try to explain what’s happening and make it understandable for people who maybe aren’t that locked in. The NBA has changed a lot: it’s a much faster game, maybe less physical and with less contact, but there’s tremendous back-and-forth. It’s punch for punch, quick responses, very little time to think. You’re always with your finger on the trigger, and you don’t even have time to celebrate a great play because they’re already answering on the other end. That speed makes the action emotional. I finished yesterday’s game tired as if I had played, because that back-and-forth demands total concentration; the numbers on the stat sheet pile up incredibly fast, like a car’s odometer. That didn’t happen before.

-You were the first Argentine ever drafted in the first round, and it was in 2003—the LeBron, Wade, Bosh, Carmelo class. You arrived a season later, but what was going through the mind of that “Cabeza” coming to the NBA as part of such a Draft? How did you process it?

-Like a famous boxer used to say (Editor’s note: Ringo Bonavena), experience is a comb life gives you when you’ve already gone bald. Back then I thought completely differently; today I wish I had my current mindset at that age. At that point, you want to take on the whole world; you think everything will work out and that you’ll stay at that level forever. I was coming from playing in Europe at a very high level, but when I got to the United States, I ran into an initial athletic shock. I said, “Alright, they jump and run here too”—the bodies and the pace of the game were different. It wasn’t the EuroLeague. On top of that, I arrived on a Detroit team that had just won the championship, with limited room for me and a coach, Larry Brown, who had a hard time playing young guys. The same thing had happened the year before to Darko Milicic (No. 2 pick in the 2003 Draft). Crashing into the reality of competition at that level was brutal. It made me a better player, but you always expect more. That’s why I envy these San Antonio kids: they’re inexperienced, but they seem very mature, and that doesn’t always happen.

-What was that duality like—being one of the youngest guys in the NBA while, with the national team, you were part of an established group that won gold in Athens 2004?

-I’ve always said the jersey you defend the most is your national team’s. The best memories are from the group. With the national team, we’d get to a hotel, drop off our bags, and heads would start popping out in the hallway: “What are we doing? Going for a walk? Coffee?” We did everything together—it’s part of our culture. In the NBA, you’d go into your room and not see your teammates again until the next day. That group mystique is what made the national team unique. Working together, whether you won or lost, you walked away empty but at peace knowing you’d given everything. In the NBA you think, “I’ll try again next year,” and sometimes trains come and go and never come back. With the national team, it was always about fighting for medals together, and that always made it more special.

-You won gold in Athens 2004 and then immediately arrived in the United States. How did they receive you there, knowing you had beaten them?

-It was crazy. Team USA’s coach was Larry Brown, who I then ran into as my coach in Detroit. I remember he was scouting me at the Olympic Games. On the first day of training camp with the Pistons, I was the “new guy” arriving at a championship team. When it was my turn to introduce myself, Larry Brown stopped everyone and said: “Guys, he’s not a rookie, we’re not treating him like a rookie. He’s coming in as an Olympic champion and he stole something that was ours, something that belonged to us. He’s played in finals in Europe; Carlos is already a veteran.” There was another 33-year-old player on the team coming from Europe, Horace Jenkins, and he had to do all the rookie duties, carrying bags and all that. I was treated differently because of the gold medal. They did laugh at me a little because I’d get lost or because of my “Spanglish,” but they always treated me really well.

-In total, you had 9 seasons, 507 regular-season games, and 41 playoff games in the NBA, spread across Detroit, Toronto, Milwaukee, and Houston. In a few words, what did each team leave you with?

-They all left me with a beautiful experience. Detroit was the first reality check, understanding that what I’d done in Europe wasn’t enough and that I had to reinvent myself. Toronto was a breath of fresh air. I found more minutes, more responsibility, and international teammates (Calderón, Garbajosa, Bargnani, Nesterovic) who understood what I was going through. We made each other better. In Milwaukee, as one of the older guys on a young team, I grew as a person and as a player. Under Scott Skiles, the best coach I had in the NBA, I understood my role: I wasn’t a star, but I was someone who could contribute a lot. And I really enjoyed Houston. I was already 30, and moving to the West and playing with talents like James Harden and Jeremy Lin made things easy. I had a lot of fun, although then I suffered the injury. I experienced the league from many different angles: playing, starting, coming off the bench, being injured, being out of the roster... you live many sides of the best league in the world.

-You just mentioned James Harden, and not long ago on Instagram you picked him as the best teammate you had in the NBA. You had also said Manu Ginóbili was the toughest opponent. If you put Manu—opponent and national-team teammate—and Harden—NBA teammate—on the scale, who do you choose?

-I always choose Manu. He’s unique and irreplaceable. Maybe Manu was even a mirror for James in a certain way. The thing is, James is a scoring machine and a one-on-one player; he had an incredible variety of moves. He’s been at the top for 17 years, always relevant, he’s a beast. But Manu is irreplaceable because of where he came from and what he achieved. I lived it with him in Italy, on the national team, in the NBA, and now off the court as a friend. Manu has a mindset that very few people in sports have. Having fought so many battles together means I’d always go to war with him. They both made me a better player, but I’ll always pick the “Big Nose” because we played together much longer.

-The FIBA windows system makes the national team very hard to play for. It’s a shame that players can’t get together two months in advance and prepare properly like they used to. It’s very hard for Pablo (and before him Néstor García) to evaluate and work when players arrive banged up or just a day before the game. Facu, Gaby Deck, Brussino, Laprovittola... they were part of that “old era” and know what that mystique is about; they’re the link for the ones coming next. I’m a fan of the national team and I always want it to do well. It annoys me when people go so hard on them, because it’s genuinely very hard to produce in the current context of the windows.

-Last one and I’ll let you go: do you think there’s a Cabeza Delfino in today’s NBA? Who would it be?

-Oof, that’s hard. I’d never thought about it, but I’ll tell you a story. Last year I went to Milwaukee with my family to watch a Bucks game. My wife, who doesn’t know much about basketball, asked me while looking at the players: “Who would you be on this team?” I look at the bodies and say: “Well, I could be Kyle Kuzma”. My 13-year-old son, who’s really into stats, looks at me and says: “Dad, Kuzma is 6-foot-9... he’s got four inches on you.” That’s when I realized I was way off, haha. Times and physiques have changed a lot. Maybe I shoot the three better than Kuzma—poor guy is kind of hit or miss there—but physically they’ve developed so much. The pace is overwhelming, and there’s almost no comparison to the basketball of my era.

This article was translated into English by Artificial Intelligence. You can read the original version in 🇪🇸 here.