Dino Rađa (alternativelyRadja,Croatian pronunciation:[ˌdǐːnoˈrâd͜ʑa]; born 24 April 1967) is a Croatian former professionalbasketball player. He was a member of theJugoplastika team of the late 1980s and early 1990s, which he helped to win twoFIBA European Champions Cup championships (1989 and1990). He spent three and a half seasons with theBoston Celtics, being one of the European pioneers in theNational Basketball Association (NBA). Rađa was named one ofFIBA's 50 Greatest Players in 1991, and one of the50 Greatest EuroLeague Contributors in 2008. He was inducted into theBasketball Hall of Fame, as a member of the 2018 class. He was inducted into theGreek Basket League Hall of Fame, in 2022.
Rađa began his basketball life in his native town, as a junior atKK Dalvin. He moved toKK Split, which at the time went under the name of its longtime naming-rights sponsor Jugoplastika. At KK Split, Rađa starred alongsideToni Kukoč, while both were teenagers. The duo led the team to dominance of theFIBA European Champions Cup, with repeat championship seasons in (1989 and1990).
On 27 June 1989, two days after winning theEuroBasket 1989 championship with Yugoslavia and making theAll-Tournament Team, the 22-year-oldcenter gotdrafted by theBoston Celtics in the second round as the 40th pick. Rađa was reportedly on a vacation inBologna, Italy with his girlfriend while the Celtics were drafting him inNew York City'sFelt Forum.[1] Right away, he publicly expressed willingness to immediately go toBoston "if the financial offer is good",[2] and thus join fellow YugoslavsVlade Divac,Dražen Petrović, andŽarko Paspalj, who were also on their way to theNBA that summer.
However, led by the club's general manager Josip Bilić, vice-president Igor Katunarić, and executive board vice-presidentŽeljko Jerkov, Jugoplastika was adamant Rađa would not be released since they had him under contract until 1992.[1] The entire case quickly turned into a months-long saga that played out in the Yugoslav media. The club'shead coach,Božidar Maljković, even publicly called on the Yugoslav Basketball Association (KSJ) to adopt safeguard policies, preventing players younger than age 26 from transferring to NBA teams.[3] After weeks of wrangling over his status, Rađa tried to force Jugoplastika's hand by travelling to the U.S. and, on 1 August 1989, unilaterally signing a one-year contract with the Celtics,[4] reportedly worth in the neighborhood of US$500,000. He furthermore began practicing with the team at theirBrandeis University training facilities.[5] However, seeing the situation as a clear case of contract poaching by Boston and its general managerJan Volk (who claimed Rađa's contract with Jugoplastika wasamateur and thus non-binding), the Split club would not budge. Jugoplastika hired legal representation from theNew York City-based Parcher, Arisohn & Hayes law firm, seeking aninjunction to prevent Rađa from playing for the Celtics on the grounds that he has a valid and legally binding contract with them and further looking forUS$6 million indamages on the grounds of "damaged reputation and lost income".[1] The case ended up before theUnited States district court for theDistrict of Massachusetts. Following a hearing on 26 September 1989, JudgeDouglas Woodlock ruled in Jugoplastika's favor two days later thus preventing Rađa from staying with the Celtics.[6] Since the player was physically already in Boston, bringing him back to Yugoslavia required some kind of an agreement. By mid-November 1989, Jugoplastika and the Celtics agreed to terms under which the center went back to complete the 1989–90 season in Split before having the rights to his services transferred to the Celtics effective 1 June 1990.[7] The deal centered around the Celtics paying an undisclosed sum of money to Jugoplastika, which in turn agreed to let Rađa go two years short of his contract's completion.[8]
Rađa was thus back in Split for the 1989–90 season. That same season, Jugoplastika again won theYugoslav League, its third consecutive national domestic league title, as well as its second straightFIBA European Champions Cup.
Despite the team's success, as previously agreed, Rađa would not stay in Split past June 1990 thus relinquishing the chance to go for the historic FIBA European Champions Cupthree-peat (which the club, led by Kukoč, achieved the following year), but he would not go to Boston either.
In August 1990, instead of going to theNBA as previously agreed, Rađa ended up in Italy, signing with the wealthyVirtus Roma despite claiming all along that he had wanted to join the Celtics.[9] He had a change of heart once Virtus, an ambitious and financially stable club bankrolled by theGruppo Ferruzzi [it] food company and sponsored by theIl Messaggero daily broadsheet, made him an offer reportedly in theUS$15–18 million range for a 5-year contract.[10] Italian and Yugoslav newspapers reported that Rađa'sL3.6 billion (~US$3 million)[11] annual salary at the time at Virtus was higher than soccer superstarsDiego Maradona's andRoberto Baggio's annual compensations atNapoli andJuventus, respectively.[12] The Boston Celtics did not insist on Rađa honouring his commitment to them, instead letting the twenty-three-year-old go to Virtus in return for an undisclosed amount,[13] but retaining his NBA rights. Reportedly, part of the reason Boston did not put up much of a fight when the player suddenly decided to sign with Virtus was the July 1990 court decision against them following a motion by Rađa's Americanagent, Marc Fleisher, after the Virtus offer came in. Taking advantage of an administrative loophole,[14] Fleisher claimed that Rađa's contract with the Celtics violated a provision of the agreement between the league and the NBA players that said, among other things, that one-year contracts could not be extended. A special officer of the court had heard the case and ruled in Rađa's favour, against the Celtics.[10]
Simultaneous to the legal battle his agent was waging over the future of his club career, Rađa had been spending the summer of 1990 with theYugoslav national team in a four-month1990 FIBA World Championship training camp that included an appearance at the1990 Goodwill Games inSeattle where the 23-year-old suffered a leg fracture in the final game against theU.S. national team, ruling him out of the World Championship that started a week later. Yugoslavia head coachDušan Ivković later revealed that injured Rađa and the center's agent Marc Fleisher asked him not to publicly disclose the player's injury before the deal with Virtus is signed, which Ivković consented to.[12]
Some observers saw Virtus' sudden and lucrative contract offer to Rađa as their retribution to the Celtics for going to court a few months earlier over enforcing Virtus' point guardBrian Shaw's NBA contract and winning the case even after the player, who had spent the preceding 1989–90 season with Virtus, tried to remain in Rome.[15]
In 2005, commenting on his summer 1990 decision to stay in Europe, even after only a year prior seeming desperately intent on playing in the NBA, Rađa said:
I was playing well. I was making a great salary in Europe. The thing about playing in the NBA was that there were so many unknowns. The NBA was more physical because the players were bigger and stronger than in Europe. I also would have had to get used to an entirely different culture.[16]
Rađa averaged 17.9 points in theItalian League[17] in his first season withIl Messaggero (Virtus Roma enjoyed sponsorship from thatpopular Roman newspaper at the time). European sports journalists voted him the second best European player that season, behind only his former teammate and friend Kukoč.
He improved his scoring average each of the next two seasons with the Roman club, averaging 20.3 and 21.7 points in the Italian League,[17] respectively.
In 1992, heled Virtus to aEuropean 3rd-tier levelFIBA Korać Cup title.
Rađa finally joined the Celtics in the summer of 1993, signing a three-year contract on 9 July,[18] four years after initial interest from both parties and the voided contract in 1989. Some two and a half weeks later, the team went through a shocking incident when the Celtics' leading scorer,small forwardReggie Lewis, died on the basketball court at the team'sBrandeis University practice facility after sufferingsudden cardiac death from a heart defect.
Playing alongsideDee Brown, 40-year-old veteranRobert Parish, andRick Fox, twenty-six-year-old Rađa averaged 15.1 points and 7.2 rebounds in hisdebut season during which he made $1.5 million in salary.[19] With a 32–50 regular season record, the Celtics missed the NBA playoffs, finishing 10th overall in the eastern conference. At the end of the season, Rađa was voted to theNBA All-Rookie Second Team, along with Kukoč, who had just completed his rookie campaign with theChicago Bulls.
In early November 1994, at the start ofhis second season with the Celtics, Rađa was looking for a contract extension on his existing three-year deal, which was expiring in the summer of 1996. With his agent Mark Fleisher engaged in long negotiations[20] with the Celtics brass led by GM Jan Volk, the deal was reached to add three more years to Rađa's existing contract beginning with the 1996–97 season.[21]
The 1996–97 season, Rađa's fourth in Boston, was marked by a left knee injury that forced him to miss 57 regular season games. In January 1997, he underwentarthroscopic surgery on his knee. The Celtics finished the season dead-last in their division, with a 15–67 record, the worst in the eastern conference, forcing a coaching change at the end of the season, withRick Pitino replacingM. L. Carr.
In June 1997, a trade that was to send thirty-year-old Rađa to thePhiladelphia 76ers (in exchange forClarence Weatherspoon andMichael Cage) fell through when Rađa failed his 24 June 1997 physical with the 76ers. Apparently, the 76ers staffers that examined Rađa determined he had nocartilage in his left knee, estimating that "because his left knee is bone-on-bone, he can play games, but he can't practice afterwards, because his knee will swell" and that "he can't play four games in six days".[22] The Celtics initially challenged the 76ers' decision to void the trade, but quickly dropped their arbitration request. Rađa had three more years left on his guaranteed contract and, according to the NBA regulations, if he was to fail another team's physical, the Celtics would have to pay his entire remaining salary. Unconvinced about Rađa's physical condition, the Celtics gave up on trying to trade him, instead agreeing a buyout of the three years that remained on his contract. Following the buyout, the Celtics waived Rađa on 16 July 1997.
In 2005, Rađa talked about his exit from Boston:
I went to Pitino and asked him if I fit into his plans. With a new coach, I obviously wanted to know what he thought of my game. I loved playing for Boston and just wanted to find out if there was any possibility I might be traded, because I had heard some rumours. Pitino looked me right in the eyes and said, "Dino, don't worry. You're going to be a big part of our offense. When we run a set play, the ball is going to go through you.' I left the meeting feeling great. Five days later, I found out I was being traded to Philadelphia. I can't tell you how much I felt betrayed. Either Pitino lied or something changed in a matter of a few days.[23]
Over the course of his four seasons with the Celtics, Rađa averaged 16.7 points and 8.4 rebounds per game in the regular season. In the NBA playoffs, where he only made a single appearance with four games played, he averaged 15.0 points and 7.0 rebounds per game.
In the wake of his failed physical in Philadelphia and Rick Pitino's unwillingness to keep him on the Celtics' roster, Rađa returned to Europe in July 1997, joiningPanathinaikos, a rich and ambitious club bankrolled by the Giannakopoulos brothers (Pavlos andThanasis) who made their money in the pharmaceutical industry.
For Panathinaikos' owners, finishing the previous disastrous 1996–97 season without any trophies (having previously, in the 1995–96 season, won both theFIBA European League and theGreek Cup) was deemed unacceptable, bringing about big changes to the team. The team's head coachBožidar Maljković (Rađa's mentor from his Split days) had already been released during the previous failed season, while his interim replacement, Michalis Kokalis, was let go in the summer of 1997 to make way for new head coachSlobodan Subotić. Also coming in alongside Rađa and coach Subotić, was 36-year-old NBA veteranByron Scott from theLA Lakers.
Rađa spent two years in Athens, winning twoGreek League championships, but in 1999, he returned to his native Croatia, to play forZadar. He left Panathinaikos partly because of an encounter withthe club president's son,Dimitrios Giannakopoulos, in the locker room after a game. The president's son,Dimitrios, allegedly cursed at the team's head coach Subotić, but at that time, Rađa did not know that the person he was arguing with was the son of the club's president.[24] He left the club at the end of the season, after winning the Greek League finals againstOlympiacos.
In 2000, he returned to Greece, joining Panathinaikos' long-time rivals,Olympiacos, in an unsuccessful attempt to regain the Greek League championship. With Olympiacos, on 16 October 2000, he scored his first points in theEuroLeague competition, under its new format in which it was run byEuroleague Basketball, in a match againstReal Madrid.[25]
He returned, once again, to Croatia, joiningCibona for the 2001–02 season. Rađa finished his career in 2003, by winning theCroatian League championship with his first team,Split CO.
Rađa was on the senior men'sYugoslavian national team that won the silver medal in the1988 Summer Olympic Games inSeoul. He was also a part of the golden Yugoslavian teams at the1987 FIBA Under-19 World Championship inBormio, Italy,EuroBasket 1989 inZagreb and theEuroBasket 1991 in Rome.
Following Croatia's independence, Rađa became an important player of the senior men'sCroatian national basketball team, most notably at the1992 Summer Olympic Games inBarcelona, where Croatia won the silver medal. Rađa was also on the Croatian teams that won the bronze at theEuroBasket 1993 in Germany,1994 FIBA World Championship inToronto, and theEuroBasket 1995 inAthens. With 1,764 points scored, he was the all-time top scorer for the Croatian national team until 2018, when he was surpassed byBojan Bogdanović.[26][27]
| GP | Games played | GS | Games started | MPG | Minutes per game |
| FG% | Field goal percentage | 3P% | 3-point field goal percentage | FT% | Free throw percentage |
| RPG | Rebounds per game | APG | Assists per game | SPG | Steals per game |
| BPG | Blocks per game | PPG | Points per game | Bold | Career high |
| Year | Team | GP | GS | MPG | FG% | 3P% | FT% | RPG | APG | SPG | BPG | PPG |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1993–94 | Boston | 80 | 47 | 28.8 | .521 | .000 | .751 | 7.2 | 1.4 | .9 | .8 | 15.1 |
| 1994–95 | Boston | 66 | 48 | 32.5 | .490 | .000 | .759 | 8.7 | 1.7 | .9 | 1.3 | 17.2 |
| 1995–96 | Boston | 53 | 52 | 37.4 | .500 | — | .695 | 9.8 | 1.6 | .9 | 1.5 | 19.7 |
| 1996–97 | Boston | 25 | 25 | 35.0 | .440 | .000 | .718 | 8.4 | 1.9 | .9 | 1.9 | 14.0 |
| Career | 224 | 172 | 32.6 | .497 | .000 | .735 | 8.4 | 1.6 | .9 | 1.3 | 16.7 | |
| Year | Team | GP | GS | MPG | FG% | 3P% | FT% | RPG | APG | SPG | BPG | PPG |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1995 | Boston | 4 | 3 | 38.3 | .400 | — | .714 | 7.0 | 2.3 | 1.0 | 1.3 | 15.0 |
| Career | 4 | 3 | 38.3 | .400 | — | .714 | 7.0 | 2.3 | 1.0 | 1.3 | 15.0 | |
In 1985, eighteen-year-old Jugoplastika junior squad player Rađa began dating nineteen-year-oldSolin-raisedŽeljana Listeš [it], a basketball player in the club's women's team.[28][29] The couple got married during late summer 1990 at Vatrogasni dom inKaštel Sućurac right before Rađa's move toRome to play forVirtus.[28][29] Their son Duje was born in June 1997.[29]
By the mid-1990s, Rađa began a romantic involvement with singer and 1995Miss Croatia runner-up Viktorija Đonlić, that eventually led to divorce from his wife.[30] Rađa married Đonlić, ten years his junior, in August 2001 on a yachtanchored off the coast ofKorčula with singerPetar Grašo as his best man.[30] In February 2003, the couple's child, son Roko, was born followed by son Niko in 2008.[30]
Rađa's son with Listeš, Duje Rađa, would follow in his parents' footsteps in pursuit of a professional basketball career, getting as far asNCAA Division IU.S. college basketball atElon University, having prior come up through theU.S. high school basketball system with thePlainfield, New Hampshire-based privateboarding schoolKimball Union Academy.[31][32]
Rađa's older son with Đonlić, Roko Rađa, has been pursuing professional basketball, representing Croatia at the under-16 level at the2019 FIBA U16 European Championship.[33]
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