David Robinson

David Maurice Robinson (born August 6, 1965) is an American former professional basketball player who played for the San Antonio Spurs in the National Basketball Association (NBA) from 1989 to 2003, and minority owner of the Spurs.

The Spurs had spent the second half of the 1980s as an also-ran, bottoming out in 1988–89 season with a 21–61 record, the worst in franchise history at the time.

While it was widely thought that the Spurs would become respectable again once Robinson arrived, no one expected what happened in his rookie season.

Robinson graduated from Osbourn Park in 1983.

He achieved a score of 1320 on the SAT, and chose to attend the United States Naval Academy, where he would major in mathematics and play on the basketball team.

At the time the Naval Academy had a height restriction of 6ft 6in for all midshipmen, and in the autumn when the new academic year began Robinson had grown to 6ft 7in.

Assuming that he was unlikely to grow much more, the academy's superintendent granted him a waiver.

But Robinson continued growing, and by the start of his second year at the academy he had nearly reached his adult height of 7ft 0in, which later prevented him from serving on any U.S. naval ships.

Robinson is widely considered to be the best basketball player in Naval Academy history.

He chose the jersey number 50 after his idol Ralph Sampson.

He began college with no expectations of playing in the NBA, but in Robinson's final two years he was a consensus All-American and won college basketball's two most prestigious player awards, the Naismith and Wooden Awards, as a Naval Academy first classman (senior).

In 1986, Robinson led Navy, a number seven seed, within a game of the Final Four before falling to Duke in the East Regional Final.

Robinson played his first three years for the Midshipmen under Paul Evans (who left Navy to coach at Pitt) and his senior season under former University of Georgia interim head coach Pete Herrmann.

Upon graduation, he became eligible for the 1987 NBA draft and was selected by the San Antonio Spurs with the first overall pick; however, the Spurs had to wait two years because he had to fulfill his active-duty obligation with the Navy.

Robinson considered leaving the academy after his second year, before incurring an obligation to serve on active duty.

He decided to stay after discussing with the Superintendent the likelihood that his height would prevent him from serving at sea as an unrestricted line officer, which would be detrimental to his naval career, and might make it impossible for him to receive a commission at all.

As a compromise, Secretary of the Navy John Lehman allowed Robinson to train for and receive a commission as a staff officer in the Civil Engineer Corps.

As a result, Robinson was commissioned in the Naval Reserve and was required to serve only an initial active-duty obligation of two years.

After graduating from the Naval Academy, Robinson became a civil engineering officer at the Naval Submarine Base Kings Bay in Georgia.

He was regularly featured in recruiting materials for the service.

Despite the nickname "Admiral", Robinson's actual rank upon fulfilling his service commitment was Lieutenant (junior grade).

Since he had not signed a contract, NBA regulations stated that Robinson could have reentered the draft after his naval service.

Although there was speculation that he might choose not to sign with the Spurs, Robinson agreed to move to San Antonio for the 1989–90 season, but the Spurs agreed to pay him as much as the average of the salaries of the two highest-paid players in the league each year, or release him to free agency.

Following the 1989–90 season, he was unanimously named the NBA Rookie of the Year, and subsequently Sega produced a game featuring him entitled David Robinson's Supreme Court.

The Spurs made the playoffs seven more seasons in a row.

In the 1991–92 season Robinson led the league in blocks and was named the NBA Defensive Player of the Year.

Robinson also made the 1992 US Olympic Dream Team that won the gold medal in Barcelona.

Nicknamed "the Admiral" for his service with the U.S. Navy, Robinson was a 10-time NBA All-Star, the 1995 NBA MVP, a two-time NBA champion (1999 and 2003), a two-time Olympic Gold Medal winner (1992, 1996), a two-time Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame inductee (2009 for his individual career, 2010 as a member of the 1992 United States men's Olympic basketball team), and a two-time U.S. Olympic Hall of Fame inductee (2008 individually, 2009 as a member of the 1992 Olympic team).

He was honored as one of the league's all-time players by being named to the NBA 50th Anniversary (1996) and 75th Anniversary Teams (2021).

He is widely considered one of the greatest centers in both college basketball and NBA history.

Robinson was born in Key West, Florida, the second child of Ambrose and Freda Robinson.

Since Robinson's father was in the U.S. Navy, the family moved frequently.

After his father retired from the Navy, the family settled in Woodbridge, Virginia, where Robinson excelled in school and in most sports, except basketball.

Robinson attended Osbourn Park High School in Manassas, Virginia, just outside Washington, D.C., where Robinson's father was working as an engineer.

Robinson was of average height for most of his childhood and teenage years, and stood only 5ft 9in tall in his junior year of high school (age 16–17).

But during his senior year (age 17–18) he experienced a large growth spurt and grew to 6ft 6in.

He had not played organized basketball or attended any basketball camps, but the school's basketball coach added him to the team, and Robinson earned all-area and all-district honors but generated little interest among college basketball coaches.

Robinson led the Spurs to the greatest single-season turnaround in NBA history at the time (a record the Spurs themselves broke in 1997–98 season, after drafting Tim Duncan, which was then broken by the Boston Celtics in the 2007–08 NBA season).

The Spurs leaped to a record of 56–26 for a remarkable 35 game improvement.

They advanced to the second round of the Western Conference playoffs where they lost in seven games to the eventual conference champion Portland Trail Blazers.