Tony Massenburg

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Tony Arnel Massenburg (born July 31, 1967, in Sussex County, Virginia) is an American professional basketball player. He shares an NBA record with Chucky Brown and Jim Jackson for having played with twelve different teams over a career.^[1] A recent attempt at a comeback ended unsuccessfully in October 2007 when he was waived by the Washington Wizards.^[2]

[edit] Biography

Massenburg played in college for the University of Maryland from 1986 to 1990 playing under three different coaches-Lefty Driesel, Bob Wade, and Gary Williams. He had a .523 shooting percentage and averaged 12.1 points per game in his four year career with the Terrapins. In his senior season, in which he was featured on the cover of the teams handbook on an aircraft carrier, he averaged 18 points and 10.1 rebounds per game, one of only two players in the Atlantic Coast Conference to average double figures in both categories that season. His efforts in his senior season earned him a spot on the All-ACC Second Team.

Massenburg was initially signed by the San Antonio Spurs in 1990, when he was chosen in the second round of the 1990 NBA Draft, as the 43rd pick overall. During his first stint with the Spurs, he was able to play alongside David Robinson. He played 35 games during the 1990-91 NBA season.

As part of his first injury's rehabilitation program, Massenburg went to Italy, where he averaged almost 23 points and 10 rebounds per game in four games with the Reggio team.

After playing only one game for Spurs in the 1991-1992 season, Massenburg was traded to the Charlotte Hornets where he played for three games before moving on to the Boston Celtics for seven games, and also the Golden State Warriors for another seven games; ending with a total of 18 games, 90 minutes and four franchises that season.

Massenburg played in Spain (for Malaga and Barcelona) during the 1992-93 and 1993-94 seasons, and he came just short of playing an entire NBA season for the first time in his career during 1994-95, when he was a member of the Los Angeles Clippers for 80 games.

Massenburg was taken in the expansion draft in 1995 by the Toronto Raptors. After 24 games there, he was shipped to the Philadelphia 76ers, where he played 30 games.

During the 1996-97 season, Massenburg once again came very close to playing an entire season, seeing action in 79 games with yet another team, the New Jersey Nets. Massenburg returned to Canada for the 1997-98 season, playing with the Brian Winters-coached Vancouver Grizzlies. In Vancouver, Massenburg backed up center Bryant Reeves. He played two seasons in Vancouver before being traded before the 1999-2000 season to the Houston Rockets. With the Rockets, he played ten games, then was promptly returned to the Grizzlies before the 2000-2001 campaign. When the franchise relocated to Memphis in 2001, so did Massenburg. During the Grizzlies' first season on U.S. soil, Massenburg played 73 games, averaging 5.5 points per game. In successive years, he was a member of the Utah Jazz and the Sacramento Kings.

Massenburg returned to the Spurs for the 2004-05 season with whom he won an NBA championship ring, when the Spurs defeated the Detroit Pistons, four games to three, with Massenburg mainly observing from the bench as his teammates clinched the Spurs' third title in seven years. However, six weeks after the season, a late-night auto accident badly damaged his ankle, leaving him unable to play the following two seasons.^[2]

He has participated in 683 NBA games over 15 years, scoring 4,238 points for a career average of 6.2 points per game, collecting 2,964 rebounds for a total of 4.3 rebounds per game, and handling 266 assists, for 0.4 assists per game.

[edit] Notes

1. ^ Miller, Houston, Oakley ... who else is planning a comeback?, updated August 9, 2007
2. ^ ^{a b} Massenburg, 40, waived by possible 13th team Wizards, updated October 21, 2007

[edit] External links

• NBA.com's Massenburg page