Joel Bruce Kramer (born October 30, 1955) is a retired American professional

basketball Basketball is a team sport in which two teams, most commonly of five players each, opposing one another on a rectangular Basketball court, court, compete with the primary objective of #Shooting, shooting a basketball (ball), basketball (appr ...

player. Listed at and , he played the power forward and center positions. After playing

college basketball In United States colleges, top-tier basketball is governed by collegiate athletic bodies including National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA), the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA), the United States Collegiate Athleti ...

San Diego State University San Diego State University (SDSU) is a public research university in San Diego, California. Founded in 1897 as San Diego Normal School, it is the third-oldest university and southernmost in the 23-member California State University (CSU) system ...

, he had a five-season career in the

National Basketball Association The National Basketball Association (NBA) is a professional basketball league in North America. The league is composed of 30 teams (29 in the United States and 1 in Canada) and is one of the major professional sports leagues in the United S ...

(NBA) from

1978 Events January * January 1 – Air India Flight 855, a Boeing 747 passenger jet, crashes off the coast of Bombay, killing 213. * January 5 – Bülent Ecevit, of Republican People's Party, CHP, forms the new government of Turkey (42nd go ...

–

1983 The year 1983 saw both the official beginning of the Internet and the first mobile cellular telephone call. Events January * January 1 – The migration of the ARPANET to Internet protocol suite, TCP/IP is officially completed (this is consid ...

with the

Phoenix Suns The Phoenix Suns are an American professional basketball team based in Phoenix, Arizona. They compete in the National Basketball Association (NBA), as a member of the league's Western Conference Pacific Division. The Suns are the only team in t ...

Early life

Kramer was born in

San Diego San Diego ( , ; ) is a city on the Pacific Ocean coast of Southern California located immediately adjacent to the Mexico–United States border. With a 2020 population of 1,386,932, it is the List of United States cities by population, eigh ...

, California, and is

Jewish Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""The ...

.Joel Kramer Stats , Basketball-Reference.com
/ref> He attended Patrick Henry High School in San Diego. There, he played for the basketball team and was League Player of the Year and All- California Interscholastic Federation his senior season.Southern California Jewish Sports Hall of Fame Home
/ref>

Basketball career

Kramer played

on a basketball scholarship at

, during which he averaged 9.6 points and 7.2 rebounds per game, while shooting .521 from the field. After recovering from a broken foot, he averaged over 9 rebounds per game his last two seasons.GoAztecs.com
/ref> In 1977-78, he set a school consecutive

free throw In basketball, free throws or foul shots are unopposed attempts to score points by shooting from behind the free-throw line (informally known as the foul line or the charity stripe), a line situated at the end of the Key (basketball), restricted ...

record of 33. As a senior, he was named 1978 Pacific Coast Athletic Association Player of the Year. He played basketball for Team USA at the

1977 Maccabiah Games At the 10th Maccabiah Games in Israel, more than 2,800 athletes from 34 countries participated in 26 different sports, including chess and bridge. The opening ceremonies were held on July 12, 1977, in Ramat Gan Stadium before a crowd of 50,000 p ...

, winning a gold medal. Kramer was selected with the 19th pick of the third round by the

in the 1978 NBA draft. He had a five-year career in the

(NBA) from

–

, primarily at center and power forward. In his rookie season, he played in 82 games, tying for the NBA lead, and in 1980-81 he was third in the NBA with 82 games played. After playing for the Suns, Kramer continued his playing career in

Israel Israel (; he, יִשְׂרָאֵל, ; ar, إِسْرَائِيل, ), officially the State of Israel ( he, מְדִינַת יִשְׂרָאֵל, label=none, translit=Medīnat Yīsrāʾēl; ), is a country in Western Asia. It is situated ...

with Maccabi Tel Aviv, for whom he played for just a few months after signing for a reported $100,000 a year.">"Tel Aviv Basketball Team Releases Highly Touted Player from the U.S." , Jewish Telegraphic Agency
/ref> He was released in January 1984.

Post-playing career

Kramer was inducted into the

Southern California Jewish Sports Hall of Fame The Southern California Jewish Sports Hall of Fame, in Beverly Hills, California, is a hall of fame dedicated to honoring American Jewish athletes, other sports personalities, and teams from Southern California who have distinguished themselves ...

in 1993. He was inducted into the San Diego Aztecs Hall of Fame in 1997. Kramer has held executive roles with CBIZ, an American accounting and financial services firm, working as the managing director of the Phoenix office's tax division .

Notes

External links

NBA stats
@ basketballreference.com {{DEFAULTSORT:Kramer, Joel 1955 births Living people 21st-century American Jews American expatriate basketball people in Israel American men's basketball players Basketball players from San Diego Competitors at the 1977 Maccabiah Games Israeli Basketball Premier League players Jewish men's basketball players Jewish American sportspeople Maccabiah Games gold medalists for the United States Maccabiah Games medalists in basketball Maccabi Tel Aviv B.C. players Phoenix Suns draft picks Phoenix Suns players San Diego State Aztecs men's basketball players Small forwards

Early life

Basketball career

Post-playing career

See also

Notes

External links