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By: Nick Gibson / @euro_adventures
You’re KK Zagreb. You’re young, inexperienced and Brose Baskets embarrassed you 65-96 in your first Euroleague game. One might say you could use a little pick-me-up.
Great news, guys: Derrick Rose has agreed to play for us!
Nah. Better pass on that one.
Or something like that, according to this Googily translated interview with Zagreb’s athletic director, Hrvoje Ciketić from mondo.rs:
Croatian champions jersey this season was supposed to carry the NBA MVP in the past season, a player Derek Rose Chicago!
“We negotiated with the NBA’s Most Valuable Player Derek Rose, even we were both agreed on the money, but not the games. The obligation of the sponsor on his own he asked absent from three [Euroleague] game, but we have to we could not agree,” revealed Ciketić.
……
“This is no longer small and cute club from the suburbs,” says Ciketić. He was sports director of Croatian champions seeing the debacle against Bamberg: “We lost, but their budget is 3.5 million, have 30 employed in a club, 64 cars available, and to the town of 80,000 inhabitants. And our budget is 2.3 million. “
I’ll assume I’ve lost several significant details in translation, but it sounds like Zagreb is being a little hasty with this denial.
The hardest thing to square away with these deals is the money, yet Hrvoje says both parties cleared that hurdle in lockstep. Now the whole thing is set to crumble—or might have already crumbled—just because Derrick has to miss a few Euroleague games.
Aren’t sponsors just the worst.
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But still…31 points, anyone? Maybe Bamberg has more employees and cars (?), but if you’ve agreed to allocate a certain amount of money to obtain the services of one of the world’s top five basketball players, you write that check and ask questions later.
Ciketić is right about one thing: this ain’t your Uncle’s cute KK Zagreb team form the suburbs. They’re playing in the best league going right now, and it’s time for them to prove they belong. Plus, it’s not all roses in the Adriatic League either, where Zagreb has trudged to a 1-3 start.
As the Euroleague’s first week showed us, these American NBA guys aren’t going to waltz in and have their way with the Old Continent. Derrick Rose is no exception; he struggled against the zone in Turkey last summer and Lord knows there are some holes in his game mechanically. Odds are he won’t roll out of bed and slip into stardom.
But you’re KK Zagreb. You’re young, inexperienced and Brose Baskets embarrassed you 65-96 in your first Euroleague game. One might say you have nothing to lose.