Lord of Turnovers
New Member
AK gave an interview to a Russian sports magazine. The highlights:
He is not going to play for the Russian team in the world championship. It was a very hard decision for him and he expects a severe backlash from the Russian fans. The Jazz were really against his participation. Sloan and O'Connor told him during the end-of-season meeting that they really liked how he had played last season before the injury and that he needs to concentrate on his recovery now. AK agrees with that, he said that he stil lhas not completely recovered from his injury.
The Jazz made a big investment in him and AK thinks he should respect their position despite his personal desire to play for the Russian national team. Anyway, the team went recently through many changes, having lost Boozer and Korver, and AK needs to be ready to go ful steam from the very beginning of the next season. He thinks that it is possible he will need to return back to his initial role on the Jazz and his role on the offense may become much more important.
The Jazz gave him a special training program, the same as the last year. He thinks that last year's training according to that regimen helped him a lot and he was able to return to the starting five. He attributes his success in the regular season before the succession of injuries to that program.
About his lat contract year: The Jazz are typically signing new contracts with their players in advance, in September-February. In any case, he spent wonderful years in Utah. He really does not want to be traded in the last year of the contract because if he get traded it would likely be not to to the team that he would prefer.
https://basketball.sport-express.ru/reviews/6783
He is not going to play for the Russian team in the world championship. It was a very hard decision for him and he expects a severe backlash from the Russian fans. The Jazz were really against his participation. Sloan and O'Connor told him during the end-of-season meeting that they really liked how he had played last season before the injury and that he needs to concentrate on his recovery now. AK agrees with that, he said that he stil lhas not completely recovered from his injury.
The Jazz made a big investment in him and AK thinks he should respect their position despite his personal desire to play for the Russian national team. Anyway, the team went recently through many changes, having lost Boozer and Korver, and AK needs to be ready to go ful steam from the very beginning of the next season. He thinks that it is possible he will need to return back to his initial role on the Jazz and his role on the offense may become much more important.
The Jazz gave him a special training program, the same as the last year. He thinks that last year's training according to that regimen helped him a lot and he was able to return to the starting five. He attributes his success in the regular season before the succession of injuries to that program.
About his lat contract year: The Jazz are typically signing new contracts with their players in advance, in September-February. In any case, he spent wonderful years in Utah. He really does not want to be traded in the last year of the contract because if he get traded it would likely be not to to the team that he would prefer.
https://basketball.sport-express.ru/reviews/6783
