http://www.sacbee.com/content/sports/story/11385211p-12299523c.html
Mark Kreidler: Stojakovic paying price for his layoff
By Mark Kreidler -- Bee Sports ColumnistPublished 2:15 am PST Thursday, November 11, 2004
They're all looking for normal around the Kings, and the plain truth is that it won't be normal for a while. It won't be normal until Peja Stojakovic finds himself and remembers how good he really is, and that could take anywhere from 24 hours to Your Guess Is As Good As Mine.It won't be normal until Stojakovic rediscovers that step-back jumper (the one that Larry Bird is convinced can become a devastating fadeaway) and starts routinely dumping in shots from 22 or 24 feet. And that stroke isn't there yet.
It won't be normal until the man sees an open lane and takes it without hesitating, or gets fully past the fact that Vlade Divac isn't around to flip him passes with such unspoken synchronicity. And that sync isn't there yet.
It won't be normal, that is, until Peja looks like Peja for more than a game at a time.
And only Stojakovic really knows how long that'll be.
And - here's the thing - only Stojakovic can do a thing about it.
Lay only small boxes at the feet of Peja in terms of Sacramento's start. The Kings didn't lose all three games in Texas merely because Stojakovic couldn't find a rhythm. They weren't 1-3 after four games merely because he was shooting 33 percent from the floor and 21 percent from three-point range.
Beyond that, it's so early it isn't even technically early. It's practically the pre-dawn of the NBA season, which is all to say that there are scores of games yet for Stojakovic to get himself right and go back to being the player - on a near-everyday basis - that he has been for, really, the better part of four years.
But as for this slow start of his, enough with the conspiracy theories and the chemistry grades and the Webberian influence and the outside-events explanations. The primary reason Stojakovic began the season the way he did is simple: Hoops-wise, he did absolutely nothing all summer.
Oh, there were factors. The people who love and support Peja have trotted out a million of 'em, and most of them carry a certain validity. He became a father for the first time. He drilled with the Serbian army, as he was required to do.
He was first shocked and then put off by Divac's departure for the Lakers, and later he was consumed by his own thoughts - and public proclamations - of wanting a trade.
Moreover, head coach Rick Adelman and chief guru Geoff Petrie actively encouraged Stojakovic at the end of last season to consider abstaining from the 2004 Olympics and the national-team preparation it would entail. The concern was obvious: Their shooting star was in danger of flaming out from so many years of shuttling back and forth between his NBA duties and the strong obligation he felt to Serbia-Montenegro.
But no one in the front office expected what happened over the course of those months after last NBA season ended, which was that Stojakovic essentially took the summer off. That isn't unprecedented in sports, but it's unprecedented for Peja - and both he and the Kings are paying the price now.
When Adelman spoke of Stojakovic needing time off, he meant that the man's seemingly near-round team preparation was hurting "his evolution as a player," as the coach told me in June.
"What he needs," Adelman said, "is about five weeks of going one-on-one, just working on things. And he has never been able to do that, because he's always playing on a team."
That one-on-one time, though suddenly possible, never came. Instead, Stojakovic focused on other things in his life and, by his own estimate, barely picked up a ball all summer. When he came into camp, a couple of the members of the Kings' staff were shocked at his poor basketball condition. It was the first time anyone had felt that Stojakovic needed to ramp up to speed.
It's not fatal. Stojakovic is 27 years old, with a reputation for sturdiness and a history of playing no fewer than 71 games in any full season since he joined the Kings in 1998.
He's also a proud player who, no matter how he feels about being in Sacramento, is basically driven to succeed. He may need time to figure out how to get those natural-feeling open looks without Divac around to commit bounce-pass artistry, but he'll get the shots sooner or later.
And when he gets them, he'll make some. And after a while he'll make more, because a career 47 percent shooter doesn't suddenly wake up a 33-percenter.
No, a start like that can only happen because there's so much rust on his shoulders that Stojakovic still hasn't shaken all of it. The man is a scorer.
He brought this dry spell on himself. Now it's his job to find normal again.
Mark Kreidler: Stojakovic paying price for his layoff
By Mark Kreidler -- Bee Sports ColumnistPublished 2:15 am PST Thursday, November 11, 2004
They're all looking for normal around the Kings, and the plain truth is that it won't be normal for a while. It won't be normal until Peja Stojakovic finds himself and remembers how good he really is, and that could take anywhere from 24 hours to Your Guess Is As Good As Mine.It won't be normal until Stojakovic rediscovers that step-back jumper (the one that Larry Bird is convinced can become a devastating fadeaway) and starts routinely dumping in shots from 22 or 24 feet. And that stroke isn't there yet.
It won't be normal until the man sees an open lane and takes it without hesitating, or gets fully past the fact that Vlade Divac isn't around to flip him passes with such unspoken synchronicity. And that sync isn't there yet.
It won't be normal, that is, until Peja looks like Peja for more than a game at a time.
And only Stojakovic really knows how long that'll be.
And - here's the thing - only Stojakovic can do a thing about it.
Lay only small boxes at the feet of Peja in terms of Sacramento's start. The Kings didn't lose all three games in Texas merely because Stojakovic couldn't find a rhythm. They weren't 1-3 after four games merely because he was shooting 33 percent from the floor and 21 percent from three-point range.
Beyond that, it's so early it isn't even technically early. It's practically the pre-dawn of the NBA season, which is all to say that there are scores of games yet for Stojakovic to get himself right and go back to being the player - on a near-everyday basis - that he has been for, really, the better part of four years.
But as for this slow start of his, enough with the conspiracy theories and the chemistry grades and the Webberian influence and the outside-events explanations. The primary reason Stojakovic began the season the way he did is simple: Hoops-wise, he did absolutely nothing all summer.
Oh, there were factors. The people who love and support Peja have trotted out a million of 'em, and most of them carry a certain validity. He became a father for the first time. He drilled with the Serbian army, as he was required to do.
He was first shocked and then put off by Divac's departure for the Lakers, and later he was consumed by his own thoughts - and public proclamations - of wanting a trade.
Moreover, head coach Rick Adelman and chief guru Geoff Petrie actively encouraged Stojakovic at the end of last season to consider abstaining from the 2004 Olympics and the national-team preparation it would entail. The concern was obvious: Their shooting star was in danger of flaming out from so many years of shuttling back and forth between his NBA duties and the strong obligation he felt to Serbia-Montenegro.
But no one in the front office expected what happened over the course of those months after last NBA season ended, which was that Stojakovic essentially took the summer off. That isn't unprecedented in sports, but it's unprecedented for Peja - and both he and the Kings are paying the price now.
When Adelman spoke of Stojakovic needing time off, he meant that the man's seemingly near-round team preparation was hurting "his evolution as a player," as the coach told me in June.
"What he needs," Adelman said, "is about five weeks of going one-on-one, just working on things. And he has never been able to do that, because he's always playing on a team."
That one-on-one time, though suddenly possible, never came. Instead, Stojakovic focused on other things in his life and, by his own estimate, barely picked up a ball all summer. When he came into camp, a couple of the members of the Kings' staff were shocked at his poor basketball condition. It was the first time anyone had felt that Stojakovic needed to ramp up to speed.
It's not fatal. Stojakovic is 27 years old, with a reputation for sturdiness and a history of playing no fewer than 71 games in any full season since he joined the Kings in 1998.
He's also a proud player who, no matter how he feels about being in Sacramento, is basically driven to succeed. He may need time to figure out how to get those natural-feeling open looks without Divac around to commit bounce-pass artistry, but he'll get the shots sooner or later.
And when he gets them, he'll make some. And after a while he'll make more, because a career 47 percent shooter doesn't suddenly wake up a 33-percenter.
No, a start like that can only happen because there's so much rust on his shoulders that Stojakovic still hasn't shaken all of it. The man is a scorer.
He brought this dry spell on himself. Now it's his job to find normal again.
