After 714 NBA games, 145 international league contests and 91 FIBA matches, Goran Dragic is officially an NBA All-Star.
Injury replacement or not, the 31-year-old Miami Heat guard has played some of his best basketball the past two seasons, maintaining momentum when most guards begin to lose steam. It's the resilience that Dragic shows on the floor that has been a consistent theme throughout his NBA career -- one that almost didn't last.
"That first year that I struggled, I had thoughts to go back to Europe," Dragic told ESPN during Eurobasket in Helsinki this past summer.