whichever player they liked back to Zagreb. Knowing Paspalj was by far their best young prospect and an asset that would soon be worth a lot of money, Budućnost's club management wouldn't let him train for a few days, which meant that Cibona never saw him and therefore picked another player. Not too long after that, Paspalj entered the senior squad. Playing under young head coach Milutin Petrović and alongside seasoned Yugoslav League players such as and the Ivanović brothers (Duško and Dragan), the talented youngster contributed greatly to Budućnost's third place league finish in the 1985–86 season and a playoff semi-final where they lost to eventual champions Zadar. Partizan years During the summer of 1986 Budućnost sold 20-year-old Paspalj to Partizan. Eighteen-year-old Vlade Divac, another rising star, also joined the club that summer from Sloga. Together with young Sasha Djordjevic, Željko Obradović and more established players like Milenko Savović and Goran Grbović, they won the national title in a final against Crvena zvezda. Paspalj played well enough to earn a spot on the national team of Yugoslavia that won bronze at the EuroBasket 1987 in Athens, Greece. The following year, in 1988, he played a leading role in the side that made it to the Olympic final against the Soviet Union, and marked himself out as a potential star with some fine performances for Yugoslavia at the 1988 McDonald's Open. Also in 1988, Paspalj top-scored for Yugoslavia at the prestigious Acropolis Tournament in Athens, which included 26 points in one half in a tough-fought 104-103 victory against US college side Duke. Season in the NBA In the summer of 1989 Paspalj became one of the first Europeans to move to the NBA, joining the San Antonio Spurs despite going undrafted one year earlier. He came into the league alongside two Soviets (Šarūnas Marčiulionis and Alexander Volkov) and two more fellow Yugoslavs (Dražen Petrović and Vlade Divac) as they collectively were dubbed the "green card five" by Sports Illustrated. At the time they were the only five players in the entire NBA who didn't come up through the American collegiate system. They were thus followed on both sides of the Atlantic with extra interest as the public was curious to see how foreigners fare in the world's best league. Paspalj came to the Spurs courtesy of the team's assistant coach Gregg Popovich who noticed the 23-year-old small forward at a