| Sun Mingming | |
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Sun Mingming (born August 23, 1983) is a Chinese former professional basketball player and actor. He is the tallest professional basketball player in the world, and was measured by the Guinness World Records as 2.36m tall and weighing 167kg. He wears size 24 shoes.
Early life[]
Mingming was born on 23 August 1983, in a small town near Bayan County, Harbin in Heilongjiang Province, China. He has two siblings: a brother and a sister. He did not begin playing basketball until he was 15 years old.
College career[]
Sun attended and played basketball at Ventura College, a community college in Ventura, CA. He played basketball there for only the 2005–2006 season, before moving on to play professional basketball.
Basketball career[]
In the United States[]
Sun played with several American minor league teams, including the USBL team Dodge City Legend, the ABA team Maryland Nighthawks, and the IBL team Grand Rapids Flight. He was also drafted by the Harlem Globetrotters in 2007, being the tallest player in their history to be drafted by them, although he would never play for them.
In Mexico and Japan[]
Later, Sun played in the Mexican league with Fuerza Regia and in Japan's bj league with Hamamatsu Phoenix.
Return to China[]
In 2009, he returned to China to play for the Beijing Ducks in the Chinese Basketball Association (CBA). Sun and the Ducks advanced to the 2012 CBA Finals but the Ducks lost in the finals that year. He was a part of the Ducks' 2014 CBA Finals and 2015 CBA Finals championship winning teams.
Personal life[]
In the summer of 2005, Sun discovered that he had a benign tumor attached to his pituitary gland. Because he had neither health insurance nor enough money to pay for the more than $100,000 in medical bills, his sports agent, Avery Loi, started a fundraiser to raise the necessary money. The tumor was successfully removed on September 26, 2005.
On 4 August 2013, he married Xu Yan. They are recognized by Guinness World Records as the tallest living married couple with their combined height of 13 ft 10.72 in (423.47 cm).