remiga007 wrote:UcanUwill wrote:
Rytas and Žalgiris used to develop talents up their butt 25 years ago, Macijauskas, Šiškauskas, guys like that came from Rytas program, now nothing like that comes up it seems. Žalgiris always among favorites in these Euroleague youth tournaments, but who was the last Euro star Žalgiris developed really, I can not think of one, Jokubaitis is the closest one. Even Hartenstein they didn't really develop, they had him for a year, and more so tanked his draft value we could argue.
Sorry for nitpicking, but Macijauskas and Šiskauskas came to Lietuvos Rytas aged 19 and 20 respectively, I don't think Rytas had much development left to do at that stage. I watched lots if not all of Sakalai games and Šiskauskas at like 19 looked like if not the best player, then player with highest ceiling in LKL for sure, at least to me. And remember Macas getting some obscure youth tourney prize at age 17 and openly laughing saying come on, let me play with grown men already.
Now we have nothing close to that, unfortunately.
In their last season with Neptūnas and Sakalai respectively, they were averaging 17 and 20 points respectively. In Sakalai Šiškauskas played with Matas Buzelis; father. Speaking of Macas, in u18 qualification tournaments he averaged twice less than Donatas Zavackas. But then Zavackas moved abroad, there random Lithuanian players become stars...
