Anybody remember Shawn Respert?

Former Michigan State star Respert had NBA career stunted by cancer

LARRY LAGE

Associated Press


DETROIT - For years, Shawn Respert swallowed his pride when he heard or read his name mentioned as an NBA bust.

Now, the former Michigan State star and director of basketball operations at Rice is ready to tell his side of the story.

"I had cancer," Respert said quietly Tuesday in an interview with The Associated Press. "I don't want people to feel sorry for me, or think I'm making an excuse about why it didn't work out for me in the NBA. I just want people who have wondered, 'Whatever happened to Shawn Respert?' to know that I wasn't strung out on drugs or anything bad like that.

"Maybe my story will inspire somebody who is struggling for whatever reason in their life."

Life was great for Respert 10 years ago.

He was averaging nearly 26 points a game as a senior for the Spartans and the shooting guard impressed enough people to be the eighth pick in the 1995 NBA draft.

Everything changed toward the end of his rookie season with the Milwaukee Bucks.

His stomach started bothering him, so he altered his diet. But that didn't make the unbearable cramps go away.

"One day I felt a lump the size of a marble below my belly button," Respert said. "After I finally saw a doctor a couple weeks later, the lump had gotten bigger."

When medicine didn't make the lump go away, Respert went through a series of tests at St. Joseph Regional Medical Center in Milwaukee in May of 1996.

"When the doctor said, 'You have cancer in your abdomen,' I said, 'C'mon. There's no way. I'm 23 and I'm in the NBA,'" Respert recalled during a telephone interview from Houston, where he lives and works. "I was in denial, so I got a second opinion. But then another doctor in Milwaukee verified that I had cancerous cells in my stomach."

Respert underwent radiation therapy every day for three straight months, but his condition didn't improve.

"When doctors then said we had to do more radiation and medicine, that's when reality hit me that this was truly for real," he said. "I had been optimistic before that and was worried about proving that I was worth the eighth pick, but then I started concentrating on just getting healthy."

The only people who knew about the cancer were the Bucks' trainers, doctors and then-general manager and coach, Mike Dunleavy.

"It's crazy, but I didn't tell my mom or dad, my grandparents, or my girlfriend at the time, who is now my wife," he said.

Respert, who lost 20 pounds over three months of radiation treatments, still was determined to make it in the NBA.

"On a Sunday morning, I had a treatment then flew to Los Angeles that same day because we were playing in a summer league out there," he said. "The Bucks had just drafted Ray Allen. Even though I could only eat soup and crackers, I was behind only Ray in scoring on our team that summer."

Just when Respert thought he had turned the corner with his health and career, then-Bucks coach Chris Ford didn't play him in the first two games of the 1996-97 season.

"That took the air out of me," he said. "I started feeling what most survivors feel, alone. It devastated me as a player and a person, and it changed the way I focused my life.

"I figured that what I did at Michigan State was more than a dream come true, so I didn't care about anything other than my health and my family. That pushed me away from the mentality that made me successful as a player, but it helped me become more happy as a man."

Respert's cancer went into remission, and hasn't come back, but his NBA career never was revived.

In his second season, Respert was traded to Toronto, where he averaged 5.6 points a game.

Respert played briefly in Dallas the next season and had a second stint with the Raptors. His NBA career ended quietly in Phoenix during the 1998-99 season.

In 172 games over four seasons, he averaged 4.9 points in 13.7 minutes per game.

"It killed me every time my name was associated with being a bust," Respert said. "I really wanted to say, 'Look. This is what I've had to deal with.' But people don't want to hear excuses in pro sports, even if the excuse is cancer.

"I just had to swallow my pride because I knew there would be a time that I would get my story out when my career was over and people didn't think I had something to gain."

Respert played professionally in Greece, Italy and Poland over the next four years before retiring in 2003.

Despite knee and foot injuries, he had a successful final season in Poland, inspired by the passing of his grandfather, Ben Byse.

"On his death bed, he said, 'Shawn, I want to see you back out there playing like you did at Michigan State,'" said Respert, fighting back tears. "I promised him I would and I'm proud to say I led the Polish league in about five categories the last season I played."

After being a volunteer coach at Prairie View A&M in Texas last season, Respert was hired in August to be the director of basketball operations at Rice University in Houston.

"I'm a man with a thousand priorities with this job," he said. "I really enjoy it, but my ultimate goal is to work in an NBA front office, perhaps as a scouting director."

 

I thought this guy was going to be a monster in the league.

Don't ever recall him being labeled a bust. It seemed he just faded away.

Kinda surprised I hadn't heard he was Director of Basketball Operations at Rice.