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Kevin Maurice Garnett (/ɡɑːrˈnɛt/ gar-NET; born May 19, 1976) is an American former professional basketball player who played for 21 seasons in the National Basketball Association (NBA). Nicknamed "The Big Ticket," Garnett is considered one of the greatest power forwards of all time, known for his intensity, versatility, and defensive ability.[1] As of 2020, he is one of five NBA players to have won both the NBA Most Valuable Player Award and the NBA Defensive Player of the Year Award.[n 1]
In high school, Garnett was a 1995 McDonald's All-American at Farragut Career Academy and a national player of the year award.[3][4] He entered the 1995 NBA draft, where he was selected with the fifth overall pick by the Minnesota Timberwolves and became the first NBA player drafted directly out of high school in 20 years. Garnett made an immediate impact with the Minnesota Timberwolves, leading them to eight consecutive playoff appearances. In 2004, he led the Timberwolves to the Western Conference Finals and won the NBA MVP Award. He was named the NBA Defensive Player of the Year with the Boston Celtics during the 2007–08 season, his first with the team.
Garnett was traded to the Celtics in 2007, helping lead them to the 2008 NBA Finals and beat the Los Angeles Lakers, while also finishing in third place for the MVP award.[5] In 2013, Garnett was included in a second headline trade that sent him to the Brooklyn Nets with longtime Celtic Paul Pierce. In 2015, Garnett was traded back to Minnesota. He announced his retirement from professional basketball in September 2016. He was inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame in 2020 and named to the NBA 75th Anniversary Team in 2021.
During his NBA career, Garnett was named to 15 All-Star Games, winning the All-Star MVP award in 2003.[n 2] He was named to the All-NBA Team nine times and the NBA All-Defensive Team 12 times.[6] Garnett also holds several Timberwolves franchise records.
Garnett made his feature film debut, playing a fictionalized version of himself, in the 2019 film Uncut Gems.[7][8]
Early life and high school career[edit]
Garnett was born on May 19, 1976, in Greenville, South Carolina.[9] He is the middle child and has two sisters.[10] Garnett's mother, Shirley Garnett, never married his father, O'Lewis McCullough, with their relationship ending shortly after his birth. Garnett grew up with his mother and stepfather.[11]
Garnett fell in love with the sport of basketball while attending Hillcrest Middle School, although he did not play organized basketball until high school. In his first three years of high school, Garnett attended Mauldin High School in Mauldin, South Carolina, and played on the school's basketball team. However, during the summer before his senior year of high school, Garnett was in the general vicinity of a fight between black and white students. Although not directly involved, Garnett was one of three students arrested for second-degree lynching, a charge that was expunged through a pre-trial intervention.[12] Due to the racially charged incident and fearful of being a target, Garnett decided to leave Mauldin High[13] and transferred to Farragut Career Academy in Chicago's West Side, for his senior year of high school.
Living with his sister in Chicago, Garnett led Farragut to a 28–2 record and was named National High School Player of the Year by USA Today. He was also named Mr. Basketball for the state of Illinois after averaging 25.2 points, 17.9 rebounds, 6.7 assists and 6.5 blocks while shooting 66.8% from the field. In four years of high school, Garnett posted an impressive 2,553 points, 1,809 rebounds and 737 blocked shots. In high school, Garnett played alongside Ronnie Fields, who also became a professional basketball player. Garnett was named the Most Outstanding Player at the McDonald's All-American Game after registering 18 points, 11 rebounds, 4 assists, and 3 blocked shots, and then declared himself eligible for the 1995 NBA draft.[14] To mark the 35th anniversary of the McDonald's All-American High School Boys Basketball Game, Garnett was honored as one of 35 Greatest McDonald's All-Americans.[4] Garnett's decision not to play college basketball was influenced in part by his failure to score well enough on the ACT to meet NCAA requirements for freshman eligibility.[15] Garnett told Student Sports Magazine in 1995 that if he went to college, he would have played college basketball for the University of Maryland, a moderate surprise at the time considering, while Maryland and North Carolina[16] were contenders, the University of Michigan were viewed as front-runners in Garnett's recruitment.[17] However, in the years since his recruitment, several figures close to the recruitment, including former Nike executive Sonny Vaccaro, as well as Garnett himself, have stated that he would have likely attended Michigan, influenced by an appreciation of the Fab Five and Chris Webber, in particular.[18][19][20]
A Chicago area high school coach referred Garnett to Eric Fleisher, then agent for 18 NBA players and son of first National Basketball Players Association head Larry Fleisher, to discuss the possibility of going to the NBA straight out of high school. Two weeks later at the Lakeshore Athletic Club, Fleisher ran a small tryout where Garnett dominated against older, more experienced competition. Fleisher then set Detroit Pistons assistant John Hammond to run the drills at another workout at the University of Illinois-Chicago to gauge NBA interest. Representatives from the 13 teams with lottery picks, with Kevin McHale, Elgin Baylor, Flip Saunders, and Kevin Loughery among them, were in the workout that was scheduled around the same time as a pre-draft tryout camp. The workout included Garnett touching the box painted on the backboard above the rim multiple times, and McHale giving Garnett tips on shooting jump shots. An hour before going to the 1995 NBA draft in the Toronto SkyDome, his coach at Farragut, William (Wolf) Nelson, gave encouragement and told Garnett that he passed the last SAT test he took with a score of 970.[21][22]
Professional career[edit]
Minnesota Timberwolves (1995–2007)[edit]
Early years (1995–1997)[edit]
Garnett was drafted with the fifth overall pick in the 1995 NBA draft by the Minnesota Timberwolves, and became the first player to be drafted directly out of high school since 1975.[23] Since joining the NBA for the 1989–90 season, the Timberwolves had not won more than 29 games in any season.[24] In Garnett's rookie season, the Timberwolves were in the midst of a transition phase; they replaced Bill Blair with Flip Saunders as head coach early in the season, and made several trades. Garnett initially came off the bench in his rookie year, but moved into the starting lineup soon after Saunders became head coach and with the urging of Sam Mitchell. In the final 42 games of the year, averaged 14 points, 8.4 rebounds and 2.26 blocks as a starter.[21] In his rookie year, Garnett and fellow newcomer Tom Gugliotta carried the scoring load. Garnett did not immediately leap to stardom as later prep-to-pro prospects such as Amar'e Stoudemire, LeBron James and Dwight Howard would, but he did have a very respectable rookie year. He was voted to the All-Rookie Second Team on averages of 10.4 points, 6.3 rebounds, and 1.8 assists per game.[6] Despite having some promising players, the Timberwolves suffered through their seventh consecutive sub-30 win season and failed to make the playoffs. At the time, Garnett was the youngest NBA player in history at 19 years and 11 months of age.[14]
Before the 1996–97 season, the Timberwolves made a draft-day trade for point guard Stephon Marbury of the Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets. During the season, Garnett posted improved averages of 17.0 points, 8.0 rebounds, 3.1 assists, 2.1 blocks and 1.7 steals.[6] He also had two games where he registered eight blocks.[14] With a 40–42 record, the Timberwolves made their first playoff appearance in franchise history, Garnett and Gugliotta made their first All-Star appearances, and Marbury established himself as a valuable young lead guard. However, the Houston Rockets, led by Hakeem Olajuwon, Clyde Drexler, and Charles Barkley, proved to be too much as the Timberwolves were swept 3–0 in the first round of the 1997 NBA Playoffs.
Franchise player (1997–2001)[edit]
In August 1997, Garnett and Fleisher turned down the Timberwolves' offer of a contract worth $102 million over six years. They thought there would be more offered to them on the basis of the signings of $105 million over seven years for Alonzo Mourning of the Miami Heat and $100.8 million over seven years for Juwan Howard with the Washington Bullets. To get out of the spotlight while negotiations were ongoing, Garnett stayed in Fleisher's Westchester County home, north of New York City. One hour before the deadline on 1 October 1997,[21] the Timberwolves and Garnett agreed on a six-year contract extension that was worth an unparalleled $126 million.[14] The contract was considered a risky move and many analysts speculated that the deal would make it impossible for the Wolves to sign new players or even keep their own. The enormous size of Garnett's contract was considered, by numerous sports writers, a major cause of labor tensions between players and owners that led to a lockout which shortened the 1998–99 NBA season. Despite the furor over his new contract, Garnett continued to improve, averaging 18.5 points, 9.6 rebounds, 4.2 assists, 1.8 blocks, and 1.7 steals per game. Again, he was an All-Star, and the Timberwolves finished with their first winning record in franchise history (45–37 for the season). For the second consecutive year, the young Timberwolves bowed out of the playoffs in the first round, this time losing 3–2 to the Seattle SuperSonics and superstar point guard Gary Payton. The two wins against the Sonics marked the Wolves' first-ever playoff game wins. The off-season started poorly for the Timberwolves though as 20-point per game scorer Tom Gugliotta left for the Phoenix Suns.
In the lockout-shortened season that followed, Garnett broke through as a superstar. Putting up stats of 20.8 points, 10.4 rebounds, 4.3 assists, and 1.8 blocks per game,[6] he was named to the All-NBA Third Team. However, midway through the season, Stephon Marbury was traded to the New Jersey Nets. Although the Wolves received two-time All-Star Terrell Brandon in return, they were not able to overcome the discord and limped into the playoffs as the eighth seed with a 25–25 record. The Wolves were defeated in the first round again, this time losing 3–1 to the eventual champion San Antonio Spurs who were led by young superstar and eventual NBA Finals MVP Tim Duncan. In the 1999–2000 NBA season, Garnett continued his notable play, averaging 22.9 points, 11.8 rebounds, 5.0 assists, 1.6 blocks, and 1.5 steals per game. Garnett also made the first of his four All-NBA First Team appearances and came in second place in the MVP voting.[6] Assisted by sharpshooting rookie forward Wally Szczerbiak and steady veteran Terrell Brandon, the Wolves posted a franchise-best 50–32 record, but succumbed in the first round to the Portland Trail Blazers 3–1.
On May 20, 2000, Timberwolves' guard and Garnett's close friend Malik Sealy was killed by a drunk driver shortly after celebrating Garnett's 24th birthday.[25] Later that year, the NBA ruled that the free-agent signing of Joe Smith was illegal. The league punished the team for the illegal signing by stripping them of three first-round draft picks, fining Glen Taylor (the owner of the team) $3.5 million, and banning general manager Kevin McHale for one year. In the 2000–01 NBA season, Garnett led the Wolves to a 47–35 record and made the All-NBA Second Team, but again, the Wolves did not survive the first round of the playoffs, losing to the Spurs 3–1.
MVP and division champions (2001–2004)[edit]
In the 2001–02 season, Garnett posted another notable season, his averages of 21.2 points, 12.1 rebounds, 5.2 assists, 1.6 blocks and 1.2 steals per game enough for another All-NBA Second Team nomination. However, the Timberwolves bowed out in the first round for the sixth consecutive time, this time getting swept 3–0 by the Dallas Mavericks led by Michael Finley, Steve Nash, and Dirk Nowitzki. Garnett's next season was one of the best of his career, his 23.0 ppg / 13.4 rpg / 6.0 apg / 1.6 bpg / 1.4 spg season earning him his second All-NBA First Team nomination and second place in the MVP voting.[14] The Timberwolves posted a good 51–31 record, but for the seventh consecutive time, they did not make it out of the first round, this time losing to the Los Angeles Lakers 4–2.
In the 2003–04 season, things finally seemed to come together for Garnett. In past years, the Wolves had practically been a one-man show, but now, the Timberwolves had made two valuable acquisitions: highly talented but volatile swingman Latrell Sprewell and the seasoned two-time NBA champion Sam Cassell, who supplanted Troy Hudson at point guard. In addition, defensive center Ervin Johnson complemented the inconsistent Michael Olowokandi. Powered by the best supporting cast up to this point in his career, Garnett averaged 24.2 points, 13.9 rebounds, 5.0 assists, 2.2 blocks and 1.5 steals per game for the season. Having recorded career-highs in points, rebounds, blocks and leading the league rebounds, Garnett was named the league Most Valuable Player for the first time in his career.[6] With a franchise-record 58 wins, the Wolves stormed into the playoffs, and finally conquered their playoff bane by defeating the Denver Nuggets 4–1 in the first round. After disposing of the strong Sacramento Kings 4–3 in the Western Conference semi-finals, Garnett and the Timberwolves met the Lakers in the Western Conference Finals. There, playmaker Cassell went down with a back injury. With reserve point guard Hudson also injured, the Timberwolves alternated between third playmaker Darrick Martin and shooting guard Fred Hoiberg at the "one", or even running Garnett himself as point forward or a real point guard. The Los Angeles Lakers pulled off a 4–2 victory in the series.
Frustration (2004–2007)[edit]
On January 4, 2005, Garnett scored a career high 47 points to go along with 17 rebounds in a 115–122 loss to the Phoenix Suns.[26] He was also named to the All-NBA Second Team,[6] but the Timberwolves failed to make the playoffs for the first time in eight years with a record of 44–38. The 2005–06 season brought more frustration for Garnett. Sprewell turned down a three-year, $21 million extension, and the Wolves wary of his injuries and age, traded Cassell for the much less effective Marko Jarić, and the team's record for 2005–06 fell to 33–49. Despite Garnett's play, the team logged the second-worst record since Garnett joined the franchise. The Timberwolves' record dropped further in 2006–07, going 32–50 that season. In both of those seasons, Garnett earned All-NBA Third Team honors.
During the 2007 off-season, Glen Taylor admitted that although he planned on retaining Garnett, he finally listened to trade offers.[27] Garnett's name was mentioned in various trade rumors involving the Chicago Bulls, Los Angeles Lakers, Golden State Warriors, Indiana Pacers, Boston Celtics, Phoenix Suns, and Dallas Mavericks.[28][29][30][31] Garnett later confirmed that his preferred trade destinations were the Lakers, Celtics, and Suns.[32] He had initially contacted Lakers superstar Kobe Bryant about joining the team as the Lakers were his initial top choice but Bryant didn't answer or return the calls. Garnett stated, "I'm just being honest with everybody. I wanted to link with Kobe. Kobe and I had a different connect. When Kobe-Shaq went on their little thing, a lot of people went with Shaq. A lot of people didn't even fuck with Kobe. You know, Kobe, whatever. One of the very few to just stay with him. I was a neutral guy, anyway. I show everybody love. I tried to link with him, and I couldn't get him on the line."[32] The Lakers originally had a trade framework in place that involved Lamar Odom and Andrew Bynum.[32]
Boston Celtics (2007–2013)[edit]
NBA championship, DPOY award and injury (2007–2009)[edit]
