Blogging the Journey: Manu Ginobili
15 July 2008
What’s at Stake: He’s going with a gold medal around his neck and the hopes of an entire country on his shoulders. Manu talks about what this year’s Games mean to him.
There was an unbelievable generation of basketball players in my city, back in the ‘60s and ‘70s, that really made people want to follow basketball. And my father was one of them. He’s always been very passionate about it and he runs a small club in my city where I always played. So I basically grew up playing basketball, dribbling a ball, being close to a basketball floor. That really helped me develop the passion for the game, and my brothers, too. The whole family was very hoops-oriented.
When we were kids growing up, I could’ve dreamed about playing on the national team, but the Argentina national team was never favored to make it to even the semi-finals. So if you told me ten years ago that I would have a gold medal in Athens, I would think it impossible.
The Olympics is about the pure sport, the passion of representing a country and all that carries. I take the NBA Championships as a huge accomplishment, but more on the professional side. I was representing a city I’d never been to before the NBA, which of course now I love, but representing your country, your colors, having 30 million people cheering for you, it’s a whole different ball game.
The biggest expectation this summer is to enjoy it as much as I enjoyed Athens. That was my first Olympics, and especially since we won the gold, the whole experience was unbelievable. So I’m going to enjoy the environment, being in that huge party that is the Olympics, and go for the gold again. It’s going to be a great challenge.
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