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Nicolas Batum retires the way most of us would like to leave something: by choice, sitting next to someone he loves.
On Monday, 21 September 2026, the 37-year-old French forward posted a video with his 10-year-old son, Ayden, and told him the news. “Yeah, that’s it. Dad’s done playing basketball,” he said. “Twenty years as a pro. That’s a lot. Eighteen years in the NBA. Fifteen with the French national team.”
Then he gave his reasons. “I want to come home and be with you. I’m going to take care of you and make room for others. I think I’ve done my time.”
Make room for others. That line is easy to read past. But six years ago, Nicolas Batum was the one being moved out of the way to make room for someone else. And he found out from a post on Twitter.
Nicolas Batum Retires: The Career in Numbers
Batum came into the NBA in 2008 after two seasons in the French league. He spent seven seasons in Portland, six in Charlotte, a short spell in Philadelphia in 2023-24, and most of his final six seasons with the LA Clippers.
Across 18 seasons he averaged 9.6 points, 4.7 rebounds and 3.0 assists, and made 37% of his three-point shots. He played in 76 playoff games. He was never the loudest name on the court. He was the player who made the loud names better – the one who passed when others shot, and guarded whoever nobody else wanted to guard.
For France he won Olympic silver twice, at the Tokyo Games and again at Paris 2024 – a home Olympics he has called “the best basketball moment I’ve ever experienced.” His time with the national team ended there.
Last season he averaged 4.0 points and 2.5 rebounds in 74 games. The Clippers declined his option for next season. He could perhaps have found one more contract somewhere. He chose his son instead.
The Year It Was “Very, Very Bad”
To understand why this goodbye matters, you have to go back to Charlotte.
In 2016, Batum signed a five-year deal with the Charlotte Hornets worth about $120 million. It was a huge contract, and it came with huge expectations. When his numbers dropped, the jokes started. He was called the most overpaid player in the league. By the 2019-20 season he had lost his starting spot and played just 22 games, averaging 3.6 points. In March 2020, one local headline called him an “overpaid Hornets cheerleader.”
Then the world shut down. Years later, Batum said something few athletes would ever admit out loud: “I always say that I think I was the only one who was happy that COVID happened because it cut my season.”
He did not say it as a joke. “I needed that, just to go home and stay home, and don’t do anything. And I went into a big depression, like I gained crazy weight.”
On 29 November 2020, the Hornets waived him. They needed the money on their books to sign another player, Gordon Hayward. Batum learned his own team had let him go the way the rest of the world did. “When I got waived, and Woj announced it on Twitter, I found out that way.”
Stop and think about that for a second. A man who had played twelve NBA seasons. A man who had worn his country’s shirt at the Olympics. Moved aside to make room for someone else, and told by a tweet.
If you have ever been let go, passed over, or quietly replaced, you know that feeling. It is not just losing a job. It is the fear that everyone has now seen the truth about you – that you are finished. (If that is where you are right now, this piece on the feeling that you have wasted your life was written for you.)
The People Who Took a Chance
Days later, the LA Clippers signed him.
It was not a glamorous move. It was a bet on a player most of the league had already written off. But Batum became a key part of the Clippers team that reached the 2021 Western Conference Finals – the deepest playoff run in the franchise’s history at the time. He stayed useful, and wanted, for most of the next six years.
In his goodbye, he singled out two people by name: Clippers basketball boss Lawrence Frank and owner Steve Ballmer. “Thank you for giving me a chance four years ago when it was very, very bad,” he said. “You helped me extend my career.”
Notice what he is thanking them for. Not a trophy. Not a big contract. A chance. At the exact moment when a chance was the thing he could not give himself.
That is often how second acts work. We like to tell comeback stories as if the comeback belongs only to the person who came back. But nearly every one of them has a second name in it – someone who looked at the “overpaid” player, the fired worker, the person everyone else had given up on, and said: I’ll take him.
An Old Story About a Second Chance
There is a story like this from the very first years of the Christian church, and it is surprisingly unflattering to everyone in it.
A young man named Mark set out on a long journey with two travelling teachers, Paul and Barnabas. Partway through, Mark quit and went home. When the next trip was being planned, Barnabas wanted to bring him again. Paul flatly refused. He did not want someone who had walked out once. The two older men argued so sharply that they split up and went separate ways – and Barnabas took Mark with him.
Barnabas was not even his real name. It was a nickname the early believers gave him, and it meant “son of encouragement.”
Here is the part most people never hear. Years later, near the end of his life, Paul wrote a letter asking for Mark by name – because, he said, Mark had become useful to him. The same man he had once refused to take. Tradition holds that this Mark went on to write one of the four accounts of the life of Jesus.
That old story says something the sports pages rarely do: God often gives people their second chance through another person who is willing to take the risk. Not through a speech. Through someone who says come with me when everyone else has said no. (For more on how second chances show up all through that ancient book, here is a closer look.)
Cut to Make Room, Leaving to Make Room
Which brings us back to that small line in Batum’s goodbye.
In 2020, he was the one removed to make room. It happened to him, without warning, in public.
In 2026, he is the one making room. On purpose, on his own timing, with his son beside him. “When you’ve played as much basketball as I have,” he said, “at some point, you have to know when to stop. I’ve done everything I needed to do.”
Those are the words of a man who got his story back. The same phrase – making room – once described the worst week of his career. Now it describes the best decision of his life after it.
Sports goodbyes often sound like this when they are honest. Like hockey coach Barry Melrose, whose farewell named his wife, not his wins, Batum’s final words were not about the points or the medals. They were about a ten-year-old who wants his dad home.
Maybe you are in your “very, very bad” year right now. Maybe you are the one who got the news by tweet, or by email, or by silence. If so, the story is probably not finished. Somewhere there may be a Lawrence Frank, or a Barnabas, who has not met you yet.
And maybe you are on the other side of it, with a chance of your own to give. Someone near you is being written off this week. You could be the second name in their comeback story.
Discussion Question
Nicolas Batum thanked the people who gave him a chance “when it was very, very bad” – not the people who cheered when things were good. Who do you think deserves more credit in a comeback story: the person who came back, or the person who took the risk on them? Tell us in the comments below.
Share This
Post 1: In 2020 Nicolas Batum found out from a tweet that his team had cut him to make room for someone else. This week he retired, saying he wants to go home to his son and “make room for others.” Same words. Totally different story. https://bgodinspired.com/index.php/bgodinspired-news/bgodinspired-sports-news/nicolas-batum-retires-makes-room/
Post 2: Batum didn’t thank anyone for a trophy when he retired. He thanked the people who gave him a chance “when it was very, very bad.” Every comeback has a second name in it. Who was yours?
Post 3: “I think I was the only one who was happy that COVID happened because it cut my season.” Nicolas Batum was called the most overpaid player in the NBA. Then someone took a chance on him. This is one of the best goodbye stories in sport this year.
Questions People Ask About Nicolas Batum’s Retirement
When did Nicolas Batum retire?
Nicolas Batum announced his retirement from professional basketball on 21 September 2026, at age 37, in a video posted with his 10-year-old son, Ayden. He retired after 18 NBA seasons and 20 years as a professional, including 15 years with the French national team.
Why did Nicolas Batum retire?
Nicolas Batum said he retired to go home and be with his son. In his announcement he told Ayden, “I want to come home and be with you. I’m going to take care of you and make room for others. I think I’ve done my time.” He added that at some point a player has to know when to stop.
Why did the Charlotte Hornets waive Nicolas Batum?
The Charlotte Hornets waived Nicolas Batum on 29 November 2020 to free up salary cap space to sign Gordon Hayward. Batum had signed a five-year deal worth about $120 million in 2016, but by the 2019-20 season he had lost his starting role and played only 22 games. He later said he found out he had been waived from a report on Twitter.
What did Nicolas Batum say to the Clippers when he retired?
Nicolas Batum thanked Clippers president of basketball operations Lawrence Frank and owner Steve Ballmer, saying: “Thank you for giving me a chance four years ago when it was very, very bad. You helped me extend my career.” The Clippers signed him in late 2020 after Charlotte waived him, and he spent most of his final six NBA seasons with the team.
What were Nicolas Batum’s career stats and medals?
Over 18 NBA seasons with Portland, Charlotte, Philadelphia and the LA Clippers, Nicolas Batum averaged 9.6 points, 4.7 rebounds and 3.0 assists per game and shot 37% from three-point range. With France he won Olympic silver medals at the Tokyo and Paris Games, plus medals at the FIBA World Cup and EuroBasket.
Sources: ESPN, NBA.com, Heavy, Yahoo Sports.
