Exactly 12 years have passed since the 2009 NBA draft, and when we look back, we have not found that the quality of the "09 generation" draft is comparable to the "96 golden generation" and the "03 platinum generation". The "Generation 09" not only produced three future Hall of Famers, Stephen Curry, James Harden and Blake Griffin, but also produced powerful players such as Demar DeRozan, Ju Holliday, Ricky Rubio, and Jeff Teague. But once upon a time, there was such a player who was recognized as the leader of the 2009 Draft, he was evaluated as a genius in the NBA for ten years, but unfortunately the fate was unfortunate, and now he is trying to recover his former self, he is the protagonist of this story - Terek Evans.
At the 2009 NBA Draft, Evans was selected by the Sacramento Kings with the 4th pick in the first round, when the Kings were in the rebuilding phase, and the team desperately needed a cornerstone to build the team, and Evans, the first high school student in the United States at the time, was the most perfect candidate for the team. Sharp breakthroughs, explosive power ahead of schedule and a good big-picture view made Evans quickly become the core of the team.
In his rookie season, Evans averaged 20.1 points, 5.3 rebounds, 5.8 assists and 1.5 steals per game. It is worth mentioning that Evans is also the fourth player in history to average 20 points, 5 rebounds and 5 assists per game in a rookie season, and the previous three players who achieved this achievement were Oscar Robertson, Michael Jordan and LeBron James, and it was only a matter of time before Evans became a superstar in the eyes of people.
At the end of the rookie season, Evans showed far more talent than his peers, and was undisputedly elected the 2009-10 NBA Rookie of the Year, Rookie Scoring Champion and other honors.
Just as people were waiting for Evans to evolve into a terrifying stadium weapon, Evans unexpectedly fell like a meteor.
In the eyes of the outside world, Evans's poor shooting ability, relying heavily on the Breakthrough Style of Play based on the European step, is extremely easy to be targeted on the court. The management of the Kings team to which he belongs is notoriously faint, the team's thinking is confused, and Evans's stadium position is arranged in a golden way, resulting in Evans often falling into confusion in the execution of tactics, and the style of play is erratic. Coupled with Evans's own constant injury troubles, severe chronic plantar fasciitis, resulting in Evans's ankle fragile, explosive power is far less than before, the performance on the court fell sharply.
In the next two seasons, with the rise of Thomas Jr. and Cousins, Evans has become dispensable in the eyes of the Kings.
In the 2013-2014 season, in a three-way trade between the Kings, Pelicans and Trail Blazers, Evans was sent to New Orleans, but Evans was still injured during the Pelican era, and Evans was gradually marginalized by the team, replaced by the same rookie Juju Holliday.
In the 2016-2017 season, the god of fate sent Evans back to the Kings, but unfortunately this time Sacramento was only a stopover in his life, and at the end of the season, Evans was once again ruthlessly abandoned by the Kings.
In the summer of '17, the Memphis Grizzlies threw an olive branch to free agent Evans, who then joined for $3.3 million a year. In the second spring of his career as the Grizzlies Evans gradually rejuvenated, as the team's first offensive firepower point on the bench, Evans averaged 19.4 points, 5.1 rebounds and 5.2 assists per game this season, and Evans scored more than 20 points in six consecutive bench games in the middle of the season, setting a new Grizzlies record.
Evans joined the Indiana Pacers at the end of the season for $12 million a year, and by the middle of the season, Evans was still able to average 10.2 points, 2.9 rebounds and 2.4 assists per game for a limited time.
Just when people thought that Evans, whose fate was twisting, would be back on track this time. On May 18, 2019, Evans was disqualified from the NBA league for two years for violating the drug control agreement, which was tantamount to announcing the end of his career for Evans, who was 29 years old at the time.
Thankfully, on May 18, 2021, Evans finally lifted the ban at the end of the two-year period. Recently, Evans said in an interview with ESPN that he has never given up his beloved basketball, and he only wants to return to the court as soon as possible and strive to recover his former self. It is rumored that the Liaoning men's basketball team is currently trying to sign Evans, hoping that Evans can become another "Hudson-style" team hero of Liaoning Basketball!