Jeremy Tyler is only 19 years old, but it seems as if the 6-11 phenom has been on the basketball scene years beyond his age.

It seems like many years ago, a 17-year old Tyler skipped out on not only college, but his senior year in high school to go overseas and play basketball, convinced that his final year of high school eligibility would do nothing to nurture his skills.

(Discuss Jeremy Tyler in our forum)

He left San Diego High School and signed a $140,000 contract with Maccabi Haifa of Israel back in 2009.

That season in Europe turned out to be a complete bust as he clashed with coaches and players alike. He averaged just 2.1 points and 1.9 rebounds in 7.6 minutes and left the team after 10 games for “personal reasons.”

He has since joined Tokyo Apache in the professional Japanese basketball league playing under former San Antonio/NBA coach Bob Hill and playing with/against former D1 American college players, several former NBA players as well as homegrown Japanese talent.

“Israel was great and I enjoyed it but I didn’t have an American coach and I didn’t have a lot of older American players that I could talk to,” Tyler said. “The situation here is a lot different.”

“Every day is a challenge for me,” Tyler said. “I’m trying to transition myself from a high school kid to a professional.”

Tyler is receiving reserve minutes with Tokyo and after 19 games, he is producing 8.5 points and 5.7 rebounds in 28.8 minutes per game.

Tyler’s choice of path has been tough, but it doesn’t let him get deterred from his ultimate goal; reaching the NBA: “I’m going to enter the NBA draft in June so hopefully Coach Hill and my support team can get me ready for that,” Tyler said. “My ultimate goal is to play in the NBA but I have a long way to go, a lot of little things to work out to become a good professional, a good man, and a good teammate.”

Read the full AP article.