On April Fool’s Day in 1985, Sports Illustrated caused a sensational stir with a cover story on an out-of-nowhere baseball phenom named Sidd Finch whose fastball exploded radar guns at 168 mph.
It was a hoax, of course. But Thon Maker is real – and generating nearly as much buzz in the weeks leading to the NBA draft.
Born in Sudan and raised in Australia, Maker has been known to NBA scouts for quite a while but seen rarely. And not at all as a college player. Thus the common reference to him as the “mystery man.