Passport Check: One Torey, One Thomas

In places like New York, sometimes the biggest and best apples do fall far from the tree. All the way from a snowy outdoor court in White Plains to the often times blue plastic flooring and widened lane lines of overseas-style basketball gyms. It is here we stumble upon a bolt of talent in the modest, under-the-radar 24 year old Torey Thomas.
"I am a gym rat, park rat. Anywhere there’s a court, I am there!" said Thomas, a two-time 1st Team All-State and All-FCIAC selection hailing from Trinity Catholic High School in Stamford, CT. Accepting a scholarship to Holy Cross College in Worcester, MA, Torey continued to prove that he’d excelled in figuring out every known method of accumulating stats on the court, particularly steals for which he is the 2nd All-Time leader in Holy Cross history.
After a few NBA pre-draft workouts and summer pro-leagues in 2007, Thomas signed his first contract to play in Turkey. In the Yellow Brick Road transit-lifestyle of an overseas ball player, Torey then played in Sweden, France, and now Holland, where he was the Defensive Player of the Year his first season in 2008.
"The biggest difference is the style of play," said Thomas, in comparing basketball in the States to the way the game is executed in Europe. "The pick and roll and set plays…The tempo of the game…And how the game is called," he added, referring to one of the biggest adjustments which is learning to adapt to international referees who have infinitely little patience in blowing their whistles for what could be highly arguable calls in an American player’s frame of reference.
Having had workouts with several NBA teams such as the NY Knicks, the NJ Nets, the Boston Celtics, and the Utah Jazz, the European leagues may actually prove to be a solid springboard from where the young Thomas could land himself a spot on a roster in the League.
"I believe these differences enabled me to become a more intelligent player and more fundamentally sound, which definitely gives me an advantage when coming back to compete in the U.S." said Thomas, who made the decision to return overseas this season instead of playing in the NBA’s Dleague.
Although not an easy choice to make, Thomas recalled that, "I was off from playing since May, and the Dleague didn’t start until December 1st and I just couldn’t wait any longer to play, so I decided to go back out to Europe in October."
For a guy who could wear his body weight in accolades and accomplishments, Thomas said that, as a professional, "Winning Player of the Year in Sweden feels the best because I was crowned the top player in the top division of the Swedish Basketball League. I am a part of history when it comes to that."
Even while Torey is making history on the basketball courts across the globe, he is making futures better for so many kids back in his hometown. Distinguishing himself off the court as well, Thomas is the co-founder and operator of his own life-skills basketball program, the New York Blaze Athletic Club.
As the kid who developed an "unbelievable passion for basketball at an early age" continues to echo his name throughout the European leagues, he still has that goal of making it to the NBA, having had another free-agent workout with the Knicks this past summer. And if Thomas would be able to add "NBA" to his basketball resume, a career timeline that is already the blueprint of a winner, that would just be an extra sexy punctuation mark.
As game times approach this season in Holland and Torey slips his solid, able-bodied arms into the jersey of Nijmegen’s Matrixx Magix uniform, he looks as relaxed and at ease as a casual-Fridays professional in the U.S.A. Only, this is what Thomas does every day of the week—he goes to work.