Lakers' Ramon Sessions isn't letting this opportunity pass him by It's tough to imagine an NBA player "never getting a chance" in almost five years as a pro, the cliche enough to make most people scoff. But Ramon Sessions has pushed back a series of basketball boulders to reveal a meadow of opportunity. It's crazy. My whole career, there's never been a point where I kind of had control," he said. Now I've got control. He's been the Lakers' point guard for one month, and it's never been easier to remember his decision to leave the University of Nevada and enter the 2007 draft as a junior because he figured there was a lack of point guards in a draft heavy on big men. His name almost wasn't called. Milwaukee took him 56th out of 60 picks, just below Herbert Hill and just above Sammy Mejia. His Nevada coach, Mark Fox, could barely stomach the draft-day drop. "He knew it was a risk to go because he wasn't projected in the first round," said Fox, now the coach at Georgia. And then to go as late as he did, I just felt sick for him because there's not a better person. He's as genuine a young guy as I've ever been around. Turned out that scouts liked Sessions' passing ability but weren't sure about his scoring. "I just knew I had to work then," Sessions said. He was sent down to the Development League early in his first season, recalled a couple of months later and sustained a fractured hand in his first practice back with the Bucks. When he finally returned, he played well in the Bucks' last seven games, collecting a team-record 24 assists against Chicago, but the momentum quickly stalled before his second pro season. There was a new Bucks coach, Scott Skiles, and a host of other small guards: Luke Ridnour, Charlie Bell and Tyronn Lue. Sessions didn't even suit up for the first two games that season. "I was like, man, here goes something else holding me back," Sessions said. Am I really going to make it? That's what I started thinking to myself. But then the Bucks' backcourt had to be reshuffled after Michael Redd got hurt. Sessions ended up being solid, averaging 12.4 points and 5.7 assists, and at times brilliant, scoring 44 against Detroit and assembling a triple-double against the Lakers. He became a free agent in July 2009 but it felt like draft night all over again. Nobody wanted him. It was the summer before LeBron James, Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh became free agents. Teams were already carving out salary-cap space. "It was a long, long process," Sessions said. A lot of teams were saving for LeBron and them. The Clippers and New York expressed modest interest but he finally signed a four-year, $16.4-million contract with Minnesota, 66 days after free agency began. He picked up the phone and called his mother, Ann, who worked at a coffee shop in a hotel for 20 years in Myrtle Beach, S.C.