It’s a question on the mind of those teeming masses of French and Atlanta Hawks basketball fans: Who is Pape Sy, this citizen of La Republique that the Hawks selected at no. 53 overall?
The fans’ wishes are BallinEurope’s command, so here’s the book (and the YouTube) on Monsieur Sy; apologies for allowing the Pape to fly so far under the BiE radar. As we run down his résumé, however, the reasons why may become evident.
His vital stats put Sy at 22 years old and at a height of 190 centimeters (6’7”). He played the two and three spots for STB Le Havre in France’s Pro A this season and Sy’s been with the club for his entire pro career of six seasons.
This season for Le Havre, Sy went just a sliver better than 50% in overall shooting, going 47-of-93 in 30 games played, including 41% on threes. He averaged under 5.2 points, just over 1.0 assists and about 14 minutes per game.
In terms of recent international play, Sy was a member of the ninth-place Team France squad at last summer’s 2009 U20 European Championship Men. Though Sy appeared in every game, he ended up just 10th in minutes played for Team France, grabbing bench time behind the likes of Marc Judith.
Bringing so relatively little to the table in terms of curriculum vitae (seriously, did anyone project this guy anywhere in any mock draft?) makes one wonder why the Hawks took the plunge with Sy; Associated Press reportage on the no. 53 selection noted that “Sy won over Hawks officials by paying his way for workouts in Atlanta.”
(That sound you heard was thousands of Hawks fans dropping to their knees to pray the 2009-10 isn’t as tragic as recent years’ crops…)
Those of you who’d prefer to accentuate the positive of M. Sy’s prospective NBA career can take some solace in fantasy basketball website Rotoworld’s clever reminder that “the last time [the Hawks] had a 6’7” forward from France (Dominique Wilkins), it worked out just fine.”
Aaaaand that’s about it at present; seriously, just check out what the excellent factmongers over at NBAdraft.net have on the man, for example. If you’d like to know more, perhaps you can friend ol’ Pape Sy on Facebook. (Turns out he’s a fan of “Omar et Fred,” Chris Paul, and … hey, Nando De Colo is a friend of his!)
