Fraters Libertas

The Luckiest Guy in Town

Rick Rickert is not known for his decision-making ability.

A high school basketball phenom coming out of Duluth, he had every college in the country offering him an athletic scholarship. After a well publicized courtship with all the big schools, and a few courtesy visits to the University of Minnesota, he decided to attend national powerhouse Arizona. A team whose offense was suited to his own skill set and a team with reputation for grooming players for the NBA.

Then he changed his mind, reneged on his oral commitment to Arizona and signed with Minnesota.

Although his numbers weren’t stellar in his freshman season (14.2 points per game, 5.2 rebounds) and his team woefully underperformed (not qualifying for the NCAA tournament and bowing out early in the NIT), the buzz on Rickert remained high. He was tall, mobile, had a reasonably sophisticated offensive game for a 19-year-old. It was for these reasons he was chosen as Big 10 Freshman of the Year and most observers agreed he had potential to become something special. He was a certain 1st-round NBA draft choice and potentially a lottery pick, meaning a guaranteed multi-million dollar contract. Since it was widely known that Rickert had no intention of staying in school for 4-years or of pursuing a degree, many advisors told him to get out while the getting was good.

But after a highly publicized period of Hamlet-like consternation and soul searching, he decided to stay in school, to play one more year.

His second year at Minnesota was disastrous for him. His numbers were flat (15.6 ppg, 6.2 rebounds), he wasn’t dominating his opponents offensively and was on occasion being dominated defensively, and his team once again failed to meet expectations (embarrassing themselves by qualifying only for the NIT tournament). Another year older, showing no signs of development, Rickert’s stock began a free fall. The consensus opinion among NBA scouts was that he no longer was a lottery pick. In fact, he wasn’t even 1st round caliber, meaning no guaranteed contract would be forthcoming.

But despite the near universal opinion that he wasn’t ready for the NBA and that he wouldn’t be offered a job there, and despite the fact that his game needed work and the best developmental league in the world is the NCAA, he decided to go pro.

Things only got worse from there. By the day of the 2003 NBA draft, the question wasn’t ‘where will Rick Rickert be drafted,’ instead it was ‘will Rickert Rickert be drafted at all.’ And he almost wasn’t. It wasn’t until the fourth to last pick of the entire draft that the Minnesota Timbewolves extended the courtesy to the local boy by drafting him, all the time admitting he had virtually no chance of making the team.

And he didn’t. Just announced by the Pioneer Press’s Charlie Walters, Rick Rickert has found a team to play for:

Look for former Gophers basketball player Rick Rickert to leave Wednesday to play for the Krka team in Nova Mesto, Slovenia.

Not exactly the prime time spotlight he was hoping for. Not even by European standards. In fact, not even by Slovenian standards. Last year Krka did finish 2nd in the highly competitive Adriatic League, however playing before a home court seating a maximum of 3,000 frenzied Slovenes. And instead of suiting up next to the likes of Kevin Garnett and Latrell Sprewell (or hell, even Kris Humphries and Michael Bauer), he’ll be sharing court time with Boris Gnjidic and Marko Antonijevic. Gesundheit. (For the morbidly curious, here's some info on the Krka team.)

So, why exactly is this man smiling?

I think only because he made one correct decision. According to Charlie Walters:

Rickert and fiancee Cici Anderson of Stillwater have set a June 26, 2004, wedding date.

Choose the wrong school, choose the wrong time to leave school (twice), ruin your career, and loose out on millions. But marry CiCi Anderson? That Rick Rickert is one lucky bastard.