In 2004, he was pursued by Real Madrid as they sought talented Latvian to back-up Louis Bullock, but Anwil asked half-million dollars and deal fell through. In the same year Šķēle was a candidate for NBA Draft, but ultimately went undrafted. Šķēle later was cited saying that it was mainly due to poor work by his agent. Šķēle felt that other same aged European players who worked out with him during pre-draft, for example Sasha Vujačić or Roko Ukić, were on the same level with him or even below it, but their representatives did better job off-court and got their players drafted.