Ford: You talk about Africa, The Pistons drafted a guy named Cheick Samb late in the draft and nobody had really heard about him. Even on the internet, the few photos that were available were kind of grainy. Then he shows up at the NBA Summer League camp in Las Vegas and he puts up pretty some big numbers for a guy no one has heard of, and I think surprised a lot of people. How did you find this guy and what kind of prospect do you think he can be? Ronzone: I think he's going to be an incredible prospect. A great story about when we brought him over to play in Vegas and we're flying from Phoenix to Las Vegas, you know Cheick speaks very little English. He speaks Spanish, French and two different African dialects. So we're flying into Vegas and he looks at me and say, "Coach, coach, this is Detroit?"
"No Cheick, this is Las Vegas"
"Oh I like."
You have to remember, this is the first time he's played or even been in America, and he doesn't really understand our coaches' terminology, but he goes out there and plays really well.
When he arrived in Las Vegas he was a whopping 205 pounds, but since that time he's put on 35 pounds. I just showed some of the staff, including Joe Dumars, a photo of Samb because I saw him last month and the first thing they say is, "Who is that? Is that Nene?" because that's what his body looks like now. His body has completely changed. We're really excited to have him come back this summer to see the improvement. He's 7' 2" with a 7' 8" wingspan, but the beauty is that he can catch and shoot. He'll step out and shoot a three, he'll go down in the post and he has great passion for the game.
Samb has only been playing basketball for only five years. He's from Senegal and he was found pretty much because of his brother, who I can't speak about right now because he's an underage player. His brother was recruited to play for Barcelona, and the GM over there is a good friend of mind, so that's how I got the connection with Cheick. Their mother said that if you take the young one you have to bring Cheick too, and he just happened to develop a lot quicker than anyone expected. We're very fortunate to have landed him late in the second round and we're hoping we've found another Mehmet Okur, but he's obviously a different type of player.