Former Chicago Bulls point guard and veteran Jamal Crawford could be contemplating retirement from the NBA as soon as next season.
One of the most notable veteran guards still available on the free agent market at this point in time is former Chicago Bulls point guard and first round pick from the 2000 NBA Draft Jamal Crawford. A lengthy NBA career that saw him have stops with eight different teams also saw Crawford win three Sixth Man of the Year award.
With the NBA set to return to game action starting on July 30 at Walt Disney World Resort in Orlando, FL, in the so called “bubble”, a lot of free agents are getting scooped up of late. Backup guards are in especially high demand right now, which makes it pretty surprising that Crawford is still available.
While Crawford could be one of the more valuable pickups in free agency ahead of the restart of the season later this month, it looks like it won’t be long before he calls it quits for good. In a recent interview with The Court Vision podcast, Crawford discussed what his current plans for retirement are and how soon the announcement could come.
Here was one of the more important excerpts to note from this podcast with Crawford.
"Do you have a timetable? Like when you say, ‘I’m done’. Jamal Crawford: I don’t know if I have a timetable but I would think for me, it would probably be at some point next season. Like it may not be the beginning of next season, maybe a team that fighting for the playoffs later on in the season. And at that point, probably if it doesn’t happen, I would probably say, ‘Okay, that’s it’."
This could mean that Crawford has one last run in him once the NBA season resumes. That is if some team is willing to give him one more shot at getting his first NBA Championship. It’s pretty crazy to think that all the success Crawford found with the nearly 10 different teams he’s played for that he never got a ring.
The last stop that Crawford had with any NBA team was during the 2018-19 season, where he played in more than 60 games with the Suns (averaging just over seven points per game). He originally started his career with the Bulls and played in four seasons in the Windy City.