It’s a good thing Patrick Ewing Jr. has plenty of practice in being patient and persevering.

He’s relying on both these days as the NBA lockout lingers on and his future overseas remains up in the air.

Before finishing last season with the New Orleans Hornets, Ewing endured being waived, D-League stints, a knee injury, summer league cuts and multiple trades ever since the 6-foot-8 out of Georgetown was drafted by the Sacramento Kings 43rd overall in the 2008 NBA Draft.

Then came a 10-day contract with the Hornets.

Then came an extension through the rest of the season and shot at returning to New Orleans to start the 2011-2012 NBA season fresh, or at least Ewing had hoped.

Failed negotiations between the league and players over the last few months changed those plans. Since then, players across the league have moved on to Plan B, which translates to finding work and cutting a check playing overseas. But what happens when Plan B stalls and you’re in jeopardy of not finding a home for a season –- maybe even longer?

It’s a reality Ewing now faces.

Hey World...my name is Luke Sikma and this is the first installment of my column with Beyond the Beat covering my first year playing professional basketball in Europe. 

For those who don’t know me I’m a 6-foot-8 forward from Bellevue, Washington and I played for and graduated from THE University of Portland (Go Pilots). Currently, I play for UB La Palma, a Spanish club that’s located on the island of La Palma in the Canary Islands and competes in the LEB Gold Division which is basically the 2nd best league in Spain behind the heralded ACB league. The Canary Islands are part of Spain but are actually located off the western coast of Africa near southern Morocco. We’re one of two LEB Gold teams in the islands, and the rest of our competition is from mainland Spain, or as they call it here, “The Peninsula”.  There’s also one ACB team from the islands, CB Gran Canaria.

If you’re wondering how I ended up here I’ll give you a quick rundown: After my college season ended in the spring I was invited to play in the Portsmouth Invitational which consists of 64 college seniors who play in front of scouts from the NBA and basically every professional league around the world. I had a good showing there and the representatives from UB took notice and contacted my agent and eventually ended up offering me a contract. So in mid August I packed my bags and after four flights and two long days of travel I landed in beautiful La Palma.

Remembering my 2005 season in Lebanon during the assassination of Rafik Harriri, the former prime minister...


I didn’t know much about Lebanon before I arrived here last night.

It is a sacred place, and has the most astounding geography I have ever seen. It reminds me of Los Angeles, only here the mountains are a mere twenty minutes from the Mediterranean.  Conceivably one could go skiing, swimming and snowboarding in the same day. Unfortunately, Lebanon has a bad reputation. It is also a place where the country is basically split into different religious and political factions.

The country has been under political and economic influence by the Syrian government for years. Pro-Syrian officials regularly hold political positions of influence within the Lebanese government infrastructure. As a result, there is a great division between Lebanese people and religion. 

Siwar is a condominium complex located in Kaslik, half an hour outside of Beirut. Many expatriates live here, and the facility has everything from a gym to a grocery store. It is ideally located on the Christian side of town, not a problem because my colleagues are living in Beirut, in heart of the Muslim area.  Lebanon is divided this way in several cities along the coast, and there is a heavy Hezbollah presence in the Annibal mountains, near Bekkah.

My arrival last night was a near disaster, because there was some confusion as to where my living accommodations were.

Dobry Den, or "Good Day" as we say in the Czech Republic.

I would like to thank everyone for taking the time out to read my column here at Beyond the Beat.

I am from Brooklyn, New York and graduated from Seton Hall University in 1998 and have been playing overseas ever since.  My first stop overseas was the Czech Republic, where I played two seasons before heading to Belgium for five weeks and then Poland for a year.  I took one year off after "9-11".

I was scared to fly and thought about giving up basketball all together.  A coach that I played for during my first two years in the Czech Republic kept emailing me trying to get me to come back to Czech while I was home back in New York.  After working as a dispatcher for a security company in Manhattan for a year I decided I wanted to play ball again and accepted his offer and went back to the Czech Republic where I have been here ever since.

I am now in my thirtieth season overseas.

Update: The magic number for BBC Bayreuth and the teams' managing director Manfred Schottner: two.

In an interview conducted today between Schottner and Spox.com, a deal could be reached between Bayreuth and Kevin Durant within the next two days, with Schottner already booking two games on the schedule in December for Durant's BBL debut. 

Two games are scheduled right after Christmas -- December 27th, a home game against Bremerhaven and December 29th, an away game at FC Bayern.

To Schottner's knowledge, Durant will make his decision "during the latest on Tuesday or Wednesday".
As has been the case with many NBA players jumping overseas, insurance may hold up any arrival or deal at all between Durant and Bayreuth. Don't be alarmed when Wednesday comes and goes and Durant is still undecided about his future plans to play in Europe.

It could be the dollars and cents of it all. Insurance woes may raise the red flag. Either way, the doubters will fall in line saying this is just a PR stunt. It's not coming from Bayreuth's side. Give Bayreuth this much: they are making the story interesting.