Carlos Arroyo

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Carlos Alberto Arroyo (born July 30, 1979 in Fajardo, Puerto Rico) is an NBA basketball player who plays point guard for the Orlando Magic. In less than five seasons, Arroyo has become arguably the most successful Puerto Rican basketball player in NBA history. Carlos Arroyo graduated from Colegio Santiago Apostol in Fajardo, Puerto Rico.

Arroyo played in the Puerto Rican Basketball League for the Cangrejeros de Santurce, where he was a teammate of legendary Puerto Rican player Jose Ortiz. He and Ortiz helped the Cangrejeros to four consecutive titles in the late 1990s, and to five titles in six years.

On December 7, 2005, Arroyo became a father for the first time: he and his wife, Xiomara Escobar, had a baby girl, Gabriella Lisette Arroyo.

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College and first season in the NBA

A four-year letterman at Florida International University from 1998-2001, Arroyo was the school's second player ever to top 1,600 points, averaging 16.0 points and 4.6 assists over his 100 collegiate games. After graduating from FIU, Arroyo was signed by the NBA's Toronto Raptors for the 2001-2002 NBA season, but was released on January 2002. He then played briefly in Spain before being signed by the Denver Nuggets on March of the same year. He saw limited action with those two teams, playing seventeen games with the Raptors and twenty with the Nuggets before his initial NBA season was over. He only played an average of 9.7 minutes per game during those thirty seven games where he saw action.

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Arroyo with the Utah Jazz

With the impending retirement of John Stockton, the Jazz needed a reliable, replacement point guard on their team. They envisioned Arroyo as being the player who could substitute Stockton, and they traded for him before the start of the 2002-2003 NBA season. Arroyo was then relegated once again to watching games from the bench most of the season, but head coach Jerry Sloan and his team of assistants instructed Arroyo to observe Stockton and back-up guard Mark Jackson, who was also nearing retirement.

Arroyo was given the starting job at his position after Stockton retired and Jackson joined the Houston Rockets before the start of the 2003-2004 season. He surprised many Jazz fans, qualifying among the top twenty players in the NBA for his first season there in various categories: By November 2003, he was ranked eleventh in assists per game, and in assists per 48 minutes played. He also ranked sixteenth in two other categories. On November 14, he broke the record for the most points scored by a Puerto Rican in an NBA game, scoring 30 points against the Minnesota Timberwolves.

At Utah, his per game numbers were widely expected to arise as his career progressed, because he had been given much more playing time each game as a result of Stockton and Jackson's retirements. Also, Arroyo played on the 2004 Olympic Games, where he led Puerto Rico to a victory over the Dream Team of the United States.

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Arroyo with the Detroit Pistons

However, during the 2004-05 NBA season with the Jazz, Arroyo had several disputes with Sloan. Arroyo lost his starting position and was eventually relegated to the bench. In January of 2005, Arroyo was traded to the Detroit Pistons for veteran center Elden Campbell (who would quickly be waived and later be reclaimed by the Pistons).

With the Pistons, Arroyo came within one game of becoming the second Puerto Rican to win an NBA championship. What was dubbed by some Hispanic newspapers as The Hispanic NBA Finals (because Arroyo played for the Pistons and Argentine Manu Ginóbili, starred for the San Antonio Spurs), was won by the Spurs, however, in seven games, with a final game score of 81-74. However, Arroyo's minutes of playing was reduced significantly due to Larry Brown's tight defensive style.

Initially, with Flip Saunders style of coaching, Arroyo received more minutes of playing, and showed to be a valuable contributor from the bench. He lead the team in assists several times despite playing fewer minutes than other players. However, again, his minutes declined as the season progressed.

On January 11, 2006, Arroyo was suspended for one game [1] after he allegedly ran into an official during the Pistons 96-86 victory over the New Orleans Hornets on January 10.

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Arroyo with the Orlando Magic

On February 15, 2006, Arroyo was dealt (along with Darko Milicic) from Detroit to the Orlando Magic, in exchange for Kelvin Cato and a future 1st-round draft choice.

In his first games with the Magic, Arroyo is averaging 22.4 minutes, 11.0 points, 3.0 assists, and 2.4 rebounds per game coming from the bench. All of these averages are significant improvements from the statistics he accumulated with the Detroit Pistons where he averaged only 12 minutes per game. He scored a season-high 21 points against the Phoenix Suns in March 3, 2006. He is currently the bench replacement of point guard Jameer Nelson.

On April 9, 2006, Arroyo injured his left hamstring and has been sidelined since.

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See also

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External links

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