A debilitating knee injury has forced star Aussie big man Isaac Humphries to retire from basketball<\/p>\n
Adelaide 36ers big man Isaac Humphries has announced his sudden retirement from basketball after constant complications from a knee injury forced him to call time on his career without playing a game in NBL27.<\/p>\n
Humphries announced the decision on his Instagram page following eight seasons in the NBL, including six and more than 100 games with the 36ers.<\/p>\n
“I’m so sad to say goodbye like this,” the 28-year-old star big man wrote on his retirement post.<\/p>\n
“Sometimes life deals you cards that tell your story for you, and due to my continued knee injury I’ve made the incredibly difficult decision to retire.<\/p>\n
“I’ll miss my teammates. The laughs. The trenches. I’ll miss the fans, the noise, and the feeling of having an entire community behind you.<\/p>\n
“I gave so much of my life to this sport, and it gave me a life I could have never imagined right back.<\/p>\n
“There is so much more to say, but for now, just thank you.<\/p>\n
“I hope the identity I created lives on in every person who wears my jersey, and in every place I was lucky enough to call home.<\/p>\n
“It’s not exactly a goodbye but maybe an until I see you soon.<\/p>\n
“So for now, and from your number 8, thank you.”<\/p>\n
Humphries established himself as one of the best big men in the league over the past two seasons in Adelaide, helping the club bounce back to become a playoff force once again.<\/p>\n
He is the second player in just two weeks to announce their retirement due to injury after Tasmania JackJumpers veteran Anthony\u00a0Drmic hung up his boots after a serious back injury, which he had dealt with across his 11-year career.<\/p>\n
Humphries will also be remembered as a trail blazer in professional sport after he publicly came out as gay while playing for Melbourne United in 2022.<\/p>\n
NBL\u00a0legend and Humphries’ former teammate at the 36ers, Jason Cadee, said the big man was a “joy to play alongside”.<\/p>\n
“I was around Isaac for his rookie season and for one of his last. His growth as a person between those stints was something that stood out but didn\u2019t surprise me,” Cadee told basketball.com.au.<\/p>\n
“I always loved him as a person and teammate. We got along from the start so well on and off the court that when I was going back to Adelaide one of the main things I was excited about was being alongside him again. <\/p>\n
“He was a joy to play alongside but mostly to become friends with.<\/p>\n
“He deserves great praise for what he\u2019s been able to achieve and persevere through in his career.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A debilitating knee injury has forced star Aussie big man Isaac Humphries to retire from basketball Adelaide 36ers…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":934298,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[574],"tags":[64,63,726,85],"class_list":["post-934297","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-basketball","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-basketball","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/934297","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=934297"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/934297\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/934298"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=934297"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=934297"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=934297"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}