Marc Gasol is a free agent this low season. He was the solid starting center of a Toronto team that reached the second round of the playoffs and played with real determination.
He will have NBA options, but Gasol may be considering a return to Spain to end his career, according to a rumor on Sportando.
According to Xavier Saiso Garcia of Radio Ser Catalunya, Spanish center Marc Gasol is considering a return to Europe, for family reasons, to continue his illustrious career.
Take every entry this time of year with a grain of salt, but Gasol may want to go that route.
The core of the NBA has become a position where teams want to get players on the cheap (except for true elites in the position like Joel Embiid or Nikola Jokic). It is seen as an easy position to fill and Gasol, at age 35, would likely only see offers of one or two years at or not much above the minimum. That’s a steep drop from the $ 25.6 million he earned this season.
Gasol grew up in Spain until the age of 16, when he and his parents moved to Memphis to be with Marc’s older brother, Pau Gasol. After high school, Marc returned to Spain and played for three seasons with Barcelona before returning to the United States to play for Memphis himself.
Pau Gasol has talked about the possibility of playing for Barcelona this season, but there seems to be nothing there. He and his wife just had a daughter here in the United States and may want to stay home.
There is still no fixed schedule for the next NBA season. The 2020 NBA Draft is November 18th, but this is the only deadline. The buzz is growing throughout the league over the beginning of February for the upcoming NBA season. That uncertainty and Marc Gasol’s level of comfort with how both NBA teams and our nation are handling the coronavirus may play into his concerns.
Barcelona and the other top European teams are already playing their program. Gasol probably also has his eyes on returning to the Spanish national team to play at the Tokyo Olympics next summer.
It’s all something to look at. Gasol – NBA Champion, Defender of the Year and three-time All-Star – has options.
