It took Sergio Rodríguez a week to confirm what we all feared. The few doubts about his future were dispelled with the image of the three veteran white musketeers raising the last league in unison and all that remained was to officially close the blind. Once the goodbye is official, it is time for resume and recognition, almost unfathomable in both cases.
Chacho’s service record is resounding, successful and enviable, the consequence of a career built with judgment, fortune and the gift of opportunity. He traveled as a teenager directly from Estudiantes to the Olympus of the NBA, a first example of his sporting and vital courage. In Portland, Sacramento and New York he grew more as a person than as a player, but he did not persist. He returned to Madrid in time to be the main piece of the globetrotters by Pablo Laso. Having won everything, he wanted to get rid of the thorn and returned to the NBA. This time the winds were not favorable either, but nothing to regret because I am sure that Sergio is one of those who think that when one door closes, another usually opens. There were two, Moscow and Milan, classic teams from leading cities. There was only one last decision left: choosing the place to close. His last success. Madrid and Madrid.
Diverse leagues, different universes, that have had the fortune of enjoying a unique and unrepeatable player and from whom he always left grateful and grateful.
To this history of clubs, extraordinary in quantity, quality and diversity, we must add their contribution to the best generation of basketball players that our eyes saw and where they always played a relevant and complementary role to the mythical surnames such as Gasol, Navarro, Calderón or Rubio. Almost nothing.
But successes aside, what makes Chacho really special is his ability to make what, how and when converge in the extraordinary, an almost impossible square. When you are great, you run the risk of getting carried away with the fuss and the decoration ending up being more important than the objective. The first Chacho suffered it, because in the celebration of the appearance of a new Carmelo Cabrera it seemed to imply the request that he make magic of each play. Overcoming this temptation was the first giant leap he took in his game. The second came when he ended up refining his aim and provided his arsenal with an effective long shot, back in the early years of the Laso era. Being dangerous from far and near, he became difficult to stop. And the third and final one he achieved with full maturity, with mastery of the rhythms that made him a marshal without having to raise his voice. At this point of preparation where the learned ingredients (ball control, wrist, reading of the game) were correctly integrated with the purely natural (magic, surprise, bravery and nerves of steel) Sergio was able to rise to infinity and beyond and stay there until the last day.
There will be no more Chacho but Chachismo will remain in force as long as players appear who understand the game as he has done for twenty years. A vehicle to have fun while having fun, where spectacularity is not at odds with effectiveness, you can be humble and ambitious at the same time, the drama should not go beyond a defeat, and you can play with a smile on your face. He now accumulates congratulations, but his greatest victory will come many years from now, when millions of people still remember how much fun they had watching a certain Sergio Rodríguez play.
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