Marcus Ginyard is a real politician. 18 months ago, he was at the top of the polls in Limoges, parading with the revealing nickname of “Monsieur le Maire”. Less than a year later, he found himself unceremoniously dismissed, subject to disciplinary proceedings which led to his amicable departure, while his contract ran until 2022, with even an option until 2023 A sudden fall that caused the closure of an eleven-year-long chapter: seven and a half months after his last match against Le Mans, we found Marcus Ginyard as a real estate broker within the company Medalist Capital.
“It’s sure that it’s a fairly quick transition,” laughs the main concerned. Previously expected as the glue-guy of the CSP, responsible for bringing his basketball IQ, his exterior address and his leadership in the locker room, the native of Rochester has completely changed his costume. Here he is now in charge of development, tasked with finding new clients for his employer. “It’s a huge change but it’s a great opportunity to familiarize myself with a business that is very attractive,” he enthuses. “I really like it, I’m delighted with this transition and can’t wait to fully discover something different. “Because yes, difficult to find something more distant with basketball. “What we do is mortgage credit. This concerns real estate properties, as long as they are not houses. Imagine that a big company wants to buy a new building in Paris, it will potentially cost them 100 million euros. Even though they will have a lot of money, they won’t want to pay it all at once. So they will pay 30 million themselves and borrow 70 million from the bank. My box will then serve as an intermediary between this company and the bank and will be responsible for negotiating the best possible conditions with financial institutions. In addition, the former Nantes winger has also just received his North Carolina real estate agent’s license, giving him the right to buy and sell properties in the area himself.
Change of scenery from signing releases at a club
North Carolina, precisely, is what still connects Marcus Ginyard to the orange ball. Passed by the famous college of North Carolina between 2005 and 2010, NCAA champion in 2009 without really playing (only three games because of a stress fracture in the foot), the ex-Tar Heel returned to settle near Chapel Hill, Raleigh. The ideal place to quickly find a job. “It was a big help,” he admits. “People already knew my name, my personality. They were more inclined to meet me, to give me a hand. Endowed with “social skills above the norm” according to Mehdy Mary, Ginyard had the merit of building up a nice network and making it grow when the time was right. “I had prepared myself for the idea of change and above all I had established relationships with many people who helped me in this transition. Surrounding myself well was the key. I knew enough people to end up with several great deals. »
“The nickname “Mr. Mayor”, for me,
it was more than a joke”
Already very close to ending his career twice in the past, Marcus Ginyard therefore took the plunge in 2021. Without any real perspective on what he was going to do in concrete terms once his sneakers were hung up in the closet. “All I knew was that I didn’t want to quit basketball to take a job and change after a year. I wanted to be sure to have a long-term plan, a job in which I could project myself. What brokerage offers him… “I knew it was an area that interested me,” he confirms. “Both my parents were real estate agents and I had bought an investment property four years ago, which gave me some notions and a general understanding of things. Now, I really want to evolve in it! »
A successful retraining, enough to gradually reduce the scar born of the early separation with Limoges? “It’s still a very sensitive subject for me, I don’t hide it,” he says, in a suddenly less fluid voice. “I keep feeling those emotions, it’s very fresh in my mind. “Because if we often overuse the notion of “second home” for foreign players, Marcus Ginyard had really found that in Limoges after nine years of instability, without ever being able to stay two years in a row in the same place. In the prefecture of Haute-Vienne, he had become an identifiable figure in the city center, then living the typical life of a local with, for example, his little habits in an artisanal roasting workshop. “On his Instagram stories, we see him all the time in the small shops in the city center, in the halls, in the restaurants: you have the impression that he is in the electoral campaign”, Nicolas Lang told us in August 2020. And when he went on the move, he was interested in local specialties, like when he came to Bourg-en-Bresse last March, where he had made a detour to the local cheese dairy to get some Comté 24 month of ripening. Above all, done enough to be underlined, the ephemeral city councilor had learned French. “Playing for so long without ever extending somewhere was something that really weighed on me,” he explains. “And I had finally found that in Limoges. I had made a long-term commitment with the club, with the city. It had become extremely special to me. The nickname “Mister Mayor” was funny but for me it meant something, it was more than a joke. Having found a house in Limoges was the only reason for my desire to continue playing, it meant everything to me. In fact, after two years without seeing his family, he had finalized a trip allowing his father, his mother-in-law, his brother, his sister-in-law, his two nephews and his girlfriend to come to Limoges. “I spent too much time away from them and it was so important to me that they came to see me in a place where I finally felt at home. »
In Limoges, Marcus Ginyard was at home, here in August 2020
(photo : Gaëtan Delafolie)
” My career ? First a lot of shitty moments! »
Because before flourishing in the city of porcelain, the former high school student from Arlington experienced a lot of things: thirteen teams, eight countries, a single season maximum in the same club. “What I will remember from my career is all the adversity I had to go through,” he breathes. “A lot of times people’s eyes light up when I tell them I was a pro for eleven years but, forgive me, there were a lot of really shitty moments. “And Marcus Ginyard to expand on his remarks by evoking “the zero seasons on and off the floor”, the wages which do not fall for several months, the legal battle born from the only trophy of his career (champion of Macedonia 2018) long two and a half years to get the contractual bonuses, the time he had to flee Mariupol because of the Ukrainian war in 2014… first come to mind. I saw some of my friends stop because of it. Why not me ? Maybe I was stupid (he laughs), I don’t know. But I am happy to have had the strength to continue because all of this has hardened me, made me stronger, wiser. Often, after a rotten season, came a successful season. And suddenly, I also experienced beautiful situations! Among them, Nantes and, of course, Limoges.
Marcus Ginyard in the Ermine jersey, in March 2016
(photo: Vincent Janiaud)
Few remember it, but Marcus Ginyard started his tricolor adventure in Pro B, under the colors of Ermine, in 2015/16. Discreet statistically (9.6 points at 45%, 3.2 rebounds and 1.7 assists), as often, but an essential cog in the good Nantes season, completed in the quarter-finals of the championship. “Without Nantes, I would never have played in Limoges,” he says. “It opened my eyes to the beauty of France. From the moment I left Nantes, my only goal was to return to play in France. “Mission accomplished three years later, with a signature that did not trigger excessive enthusiasm at Beaublanc. However, his first season in Limoges is unanimous. Quickly becoming a part of the CSP workforce, Marcus Ginyard improves the collective of Mehdy Mary, performs on the ground, seduces outside. To the point of being offered a multi-year extension… The rest will unfortunately not be of the same ilk. If he denies having relaxed after securing a long-term commitment, the American winger clearly did not meet expectations. “At the end of the season, I have rarely been so disappointed by a player,” tackled sports director Crawford Palmer in June in the columns of Le Populaire du Centre. “We needed a leader. When you’re co-captain and you’ve signed a three-year contract, that involves responsibilities. It’s not just about taking your check at the end of the month. »
The Limoges injury:
“I feel like I should still be there”
Going from 10.3 to 5.6 on average from one season to another, Ginyard does not slip away, despite some extenuating circumstances. “Obviously my season has been bad. But there were a lot of factors that came into play, a lot of personal things that people will never know. Imagine going through tough times and at the same time not going home for two years, not seeing your family. Mentally, I did not manage to pass the course to be successful and I must assume the responsibilities. But could you imagine doing it that way? “When the CSP decided that we separate, it broke my heart,” he says. “To find myself abandoned like this, without explanation, to hear that it was my fault, it was a horrible feeling. “The main grievances mentioned at the time of the divorce by the local press were the reservation of his plane tickets before the last match or the fact of having dried up the balance sheet at the end of the season.
In all competitions, Marcus Ginyard has worn the Limougeaud jersey 61 times
(photo: Sebastien Grasset)
Needless to say, this heartbreaking end will therefore have precipitated his transition. “It was too much to ask me to find a new club to play basketball again, a new place to settle down, etc. I had a wonderful opportunity to find stability in my life, to come back close to family and to follow a path that will last my entire life. The window to play basketball is short, life is long. It was more important for me to start my second career, especially considering everything that happened at the end with the CSP. The last image is often the most striking but, at least, in the case of the neo-broker, this is true. “Why did I like Limoges so much? There was something about this town that looked like me. People have been amazing to me, extremely welcoming. Many have invited me to their homes. There was a special connection, which happened quickly, it’s hard to explain. Limoges will forever remain one of the most special places on earth for me and I can’t wait to go back. What makes this Limoges story “bitter-sweet” and complicates the ambition to experience the beginning of a peaceful retraining. “I feel like I should still be there,” he whispers. “So yeah, I keep thinking about it. Especially since even in a quest a priori totally different – the search for the best borrowing rates from financial institutions in North Carolina – certain elements still continue to link him inexorably to the orange ball. “Look, just imagine that I recently met a potential client in Raleigh who has already done business in Nantes,” he laughs, before hanging up and going back to work. “During a business lunch, we found ourselves discussing Nantes for ten minutes. And if one day he crosses paths with someone who knows Limoges, he will surely have to plan the whole meal to talk about it…
