Australian NBA champion Aron Baynes has announced his immediate retirement from basketball.
The 37-year-old centre left NBL side the Brisbane Bullets ahead of the 2024/25 season but it was not until Thursday morning that his management confirmed he had decided to bow out.
The New Zealand-born, Queensland-raised star will be remembered as one of the greatest big men in Australian basketball history.
Baynes is one of only three Australian men to have won both an NBA championship and an Olympic medal, having played in the Boomers’ bronze medal-winning Tokyo Games campaign.
At 208cm tall and with a schoolboy rugby league background, Baynes’ physical toughness and size were his defining traits across 576 games and nine seasons in the NBA.
He won the 2013/14 championship with San Antonio Spurs in his first full season as an NBA player, alongside countryman Patty Mills, and made his last appearance in the league with Toronto in 2021.
Baynes previously held the record for most three-pointers in an NBA game by a centre, but his nine triples for Phoenix against Portland in 2020 was bested by Karl-Anthony Towns (10) last season.
The Washington State alumnus, who began his professional career in Europe, also spent time contracted at the Detroit Pistons, Boston Celtics and Phoenix Suns.
Alongside three Olympic campaigns, Baynes suited up for the Boomers at three World Cups, including during Australia’s fourth-placed finish in 2019 – their best result at the tournament.
A serious spinal cord injury threatened Baynes’ career during the Tokyo Games, with the centre initially unable to walk after being discovered on the ground in the team’s change-room.
After months in hospital, he made an inspirational return to the court with the Bullets from 2022 but had his minutes curtailed in the final year of his contract.
Baynes said as recently as last month that he had not yet made a firm decision on his future but now begins retirement.
Agent Daniel Moldovan paid tribute to Baynes on social media.
“You embody everything that we preach to young athletes about professionalism, dedication and playing for the name on the front of the jersey, not on the back,” he wrote on Instagram.
