'Greek freak' offers rare highlight in Milwaukee Bucks' season

Milwaukee Bucks rookie forward Giannis Antetokounmpo has managed to enthrall National Basketball Association fans and coaches this season despite playing on the league's worst team.

Antetokounmpo's statistics are anything but gaudy, averaging seven points, 4.4 rebounds and two assists through 66 games. His jump shot needs work and defensive awareness lapses at times.

So why is the buzz justified for the beloved Bucks forward known as «The Greek Freak» in NBA circles?

At 18 years and 318 days old, Antetokounmpo made his NBA debut last October as the 15th youngest player ever and the youngest since the league implemented a rookie age limit in 2005. Since then, his court vision has, in moments, dropped jaws.

In one sequence during Monday's road game versus the Los Angeles Clippers he blocked Hedo Turkoglu's layup, ran back down the court and dunked in transition. His athleticism, effort and rawness fuel imaginations of what he could become.

Antetokounmpo received his Greek citizenship last May, the country in which he had lived his whole life and to where his parents Veronica and Charles immigrated in 1991 due to Nigeria's troubled economy.

He and his family held a slew of jobs, from picking oranges to selling sunglasses. Now, his parents and two younger brothers live in Milwaukee.

African immigrants in Greece are often the target of racial epithets, but Antetokounmpo says he faced none while growing up.

However, after the Bucks selected him 15th overall in the 2013 NBA Draft, Greek parliament member Nikos Michaloliakos of the Golden Dawn party said, in reference to Antetokounmpo, «if you give a chimpanzee in the zoo a banana and a flag, is he Greek?"

"It didn't affect me,» said...