Who Is Cedi Osman of Nba? Here’s Everything You Need to Know
Cedi Osman was given birth to on the 8th of April in 1995. He was born in Macedonia with a pretty diverse parentage – his father being ethnic Turkish while his mother was a Bosniak from Novi Pazar, Serbia. Before Osman came, his parents had a son, who is also a basketball player like his younger brother. It is therefore not surprising that Cedi started playing basketball at a rather young age of six. He started then as part of the KK Bosna’s youth teams in 2001.
He was a very talented player while he was with KK Bosna and in 2007 was able to get in with the junior teams of Anadolu Efes, which is a professional Turkish basketball team based in Istanbul. The fact that his father was Turkish meant that he had already been naturalized as a citizen and so he could start to represent the Turkish National Basketball team, something that he continues to do to date.
At Anadolu Efes, Osman signed a youth contract in 2007. In the 2011 – 2012 season he got loaned to the Turkish team, Pertevniyal. Osman was set to return to his home team when in 2012 he was given a professional contract to stay at Anadolu Efes as a senior player.
On June 25, 2015, Cedi Osman was selected as the 31st overall pick in the 2015 NBA draft by the Timberwolves. This may seem contrary to the initial details we have given about his current team, but there is a very simple explanation. The Timberwolves actually traded Osman’s draft rights to the Cleveland Cavaliers and got another talented player Tyus Jones in exchange. So despite the time when he was selected and drafted into the NBA, Osman only became an NBA player in July 2017 when he signed with the Cleveland Cavaliers.
Before he left Anadolu Efes, he played 98 games with 53 starts and averaged 6.7 points and 2.9 rebounds per game. He was a BSL All-Star in each of his last three seasons and won the 2015 Turkish Cup and the 2015 Turkish Supercup with Anadolu Efes.
Osman began his journey to the Turkish Senior National team by first playing for Turkey’s junior national teams. At the junior level, he played in a few tournaments like the 2011 FIBA Europe Under-16 Championship. He won a bronze medal in 2012 after playing in the Albert Schweitzer Tournament of that year. He was also named as the Most Talented Player. Cedi and his team walked away with a gold medal in 2013 and 2014 at the FIBA Europe Under-18/ Under-20 Championship. He was named in the All-Tournament Team and picked for the MVP in 2014.
His career at the Turkish Senior National Team has also born similar fruits. At the senior level, he has also played with the team in quite a number of tournaments helping them to qualify and to crush the competition at various games.
Joining the NBA did not mean slowing down for Cedi Osman. He continues to put in his best in every game and has so far, managed 61 regular-season games for the Cleveland Cavaliers. Of those 61 games, he has started 12 with an average of 2 rebounds per game. His points per game stand at 3.9. In 2018, he played 14 times for the Cavaliers and starting none of the games. He had an average of 4.4 minutes per game and points per game of 1.0.
