NBA Great Tim Duncan Retiring After 19 Seasons In San Antonio

San Antonio, TX — NBA star player Tim Duncan on Monday announced his plans to retire.

At 40, Duncan has logged 19 seasons for the NBA — all of them spent with just one team, the San Antonio Spurs. In that time, he led the team to five NBA championships, secured the league MVP title twice, won three NBA Finals MVP trophies and is widely considered the best power forward ever.

He is most certainly a future Hall of Fame inductee.

The Spurs franchise picked Duncan No. 1 overall in the 1997 draft, winning the draft lottery after a dismal 20-62 record the prior season due to injuries. With his arrival — joined by Hall of Famer and himself one of the greats, David Robinson — the team was never to be the same, on its way to becoming one of the winningest teams in NBA history.

Alongside the 7-foot-1 Robinson in the early days of his arrival, the 6-foot-11 Duncan formed one half of a duo dubbed the "Twin Towers" that served to intimidate opponents. With the formidable assist of Duncan, Robinson was able to secure the NBA rings that had long eluded him — two of them in fact, in 1999 and 2003 — since his own momentous arrival for the 1989-90 season.

After Robinson's retirement, the Spurs' Duncan-led winning seasons continued as he formed something of a triumvirate with Manu Ginobili and Tony Parker as they led their team to three more NBA Finals championships.

Duncan, a Wake Forest graduate, would go on to become the Spurs all-time leader in total points (26,496), rebounds (15,091), blocked shots (3,020), minutes (47,368) and games played (1,392), as well as third in assists (4,225). He's the fifth all-time in double-doubles (841) and blocks, sixth in rebounding and 14th in scoring in NBA history.

As if those accomplishments weren't enough, Duncan is the only player in NBA history to play more than 9,000 career minutes in the playoffs, ranking first all-time in postseason double-doubles (164) and blocks (568), third in rebounds (2,859) and sixth in points (5,172). He appeared in 251 postseason contests (second all-time) and averaged 20.6 points, 11.4 rebounds and 3.0 assists in 37.3 minutes while shooting .501 (1,975-3,939) from the field.

In San Antonio — where fans refer to Duncan affectionately as "Timmy," speaking of him as if a member of the family even without ever have personally met him — the populace is racked with anxiety as to what Duncan's absence will mean for the Spurs.

Only time will tell. But the legacy Duncan leaves behind is timeless, its impact truly transforming in a way that cannot be easily erased even in his retirement.

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