P.J. Tucker was never an NBA All-Star, but he started on some pretty good teams over the course of a professional basketball career spanning two decades.
That career officially ended Thursday, with Tucker announcing his retirement on Instagram.
The 41-year-old Tucker ended up playing for eight different NBA teams, winning an NBA title with the 2020-21 Milwaukee Bucks. He played for the New York Knicks last season, going unsigned after New York declined his team option for 2025-26.
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It took a long time for Tucker, notably undersized as a 6-foot-5 forward, to find anything resembling NBA success. He was a second-round draft pick out of Texas for the Toronto Raptors in 2006 and played sparingly as a rookie, spending more time in the D-League.
After getting waived and failing to find an NBA home, Tucker spent the next five seasons playing internationally for teams in Israel, Ukraine, Greece, Italy and Germany. He made a return to the NBA with the Phoenix Suns in 2012 and stuck around a bit longer that time, distinguishing himself as a starter-level defender who could do the dirty work in every phase of the game.
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Tucker wound up appearing nine different times in the playoffs. After playing only 83 minutes total as a rookie, he logged more than 3,000 in his postseason career. He started 19 of 23 postseason games for the champion Bucks and made more than $90 million in his career, per Spotrac.
