Is Europe a better place to play basketball? It depends on who you ask. Since former Charlotte Hornets’ guard Aaron Harrison was asked about his experience in this case, the answer is an astounding no.
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Harrison, along with his brother Andrew, had declared for the NBA draft in 2015. Since then, basketball has taken him all across the globe. Aaron has been part of teams like the Kaohsiung Steelers in Taiwan, the Capitanes de Arecibo in Puerto Rico, FC Porto in Portugal, and Khimki in Russia, among others.
Aaron is currently back in the Americas, playing for Diablos Rojos del México, and features for the La Familia team with his brother Andrew. Although the experience he has gained through all this travel has been fabulous, Aaron believes the next generation of ballers should know that despite the allure of Europe, the United States is where they would want to be.
“My first year overseas … we played a team called Red Star, which is in the same place as Partizan, and a fan got killed at the game prior … in at our arena,” Aaron revealed. “So, the next year, we had to go to their arena,” he added nonchalantly.
“I’m talking about … we might have probably lost by like 40, but I couldn’t hear … I couldn’t hear myself clap. I couldn’t hear anything. They were throwing s*** at us. They had to walk us off the bus one by one,” he continued on the Run Your Race podcast.
Aaron continued to reveal the involvement of police with riot gear on, eliciting a rather genuine WTF from one of the show’s hosts.
“Officers with the shields, one by one. They were waiting for us at the bus. They were throwing pennies, nickels, bottles at us on the court the whole game. The officers had to walk us to the middle of the court like with shields because when we came out of the locker room, they threw drinks on us,” he added, later calling it the most intense situation he’s ever played in.
According to Aaron, what happens during the game is only a part of it. Talking about his experience playing in Greece, he said that the Greeks were a very passionate people, but they do cross lines every so often. “Y’all lose a game, they’re in your DMs. Crazy. Going crazy for sure.”
Aaron claimed that when American athletes are overseas, they need to respect the country and its people. For instance, if somebody told them not to go somewhere, the best option is to heed that advice.
“If you see somebody with a beautiful wife or something over there, they are probably connected in some way. Leave her alone. This is dangerous. I know people who got like who been like robbed and kidnapped and s*** from like a girl telling them to come somewhere …” the former Hornets’ guard warned.
In essence, while Europe does provide a rather unique opportunity, especially for players who might have limited options within the United States, it is also an unknown land with extremely different cultural experiences.
