Barcelona Jabari Parker is no Nikola Mirotic, but his impact on the game continues to grow. Seven months after his signing for Barça, the American power forward is already perfectly adapted to European basketball. His metamorphosis lacks secrets. “I think the only difference is that the team is doing things really well. I may be contributing more, but the really important thing is that the team is playing exceptionally. I needed more games and more experience to accelerate my progress and continue to grow. The only thing that both I and the team needed was some time,” he says.
Its integration was not simple, but it has been completed successfully. When the decisive moments of the matches arrive, he doesn’t even flinch. He looks so calm that he seems like ice. “The key is to be clear in your head that it is just a game. No matter how important it may seem to us, what happens on the floor is not life or death. There are soldiers who are defending our country in conflict zones and that Yes, it is because you are nervous. That is working under pressure, because your life is hanging by a thread. Basketball is my passion and I always want to win, but you have to see things with perspective and compare them with the things in the world that really exist. They matter. Having pressure is having financial problems and having to find the resources so that your children eat, not play basketball,” explains Parker.
His average in the Endesa League is 10.9 points and 2.7 rebounds, figures that he confirms in the Euroleague, in which he scores 10.2 points and 4.3 rebounds. “A season is not a sprint, it is more like a marathon. If you lose a game, you must forget about it as soon as possible and focus on the next thing because, if not, you can lose your balance. Even if they hurt us, we cannot live through defeats at the same time. just like a fan,” he confesses.
The power forward defends the work of Roger Grimau on the culé bench. “Communication with the coach is very fluid. He helps us by preparing each game very well, but the defeats are not his responsibility but rather the responsibility of the players who are on the court. The coaches are always in the eye of the hurricane and that does not go to change, but the responsibility lies with the players,” admits the player, who will decide his future when the season ends.
Parker has reunited at Barça with Ricky Rubio, of whom he was an admirer. “The mind is everything for an athlete. If you can’t control your mind, you can’t direct your body. 90% of everything is mental. The physical part is reduced to 10%. The reason why I didn’t play last season is because my mind, after years changing teams, was not prepared. I needed a break, so I identify a lot with Ricky,” he says.
His life in Barcelona is very quiet. “I am living an experience that I would never have imagined. I never thought I would be living in Spain. I still have many friends in Chicago who have never left the country. Although I still have many things to discover, I feel comfortable and integrated in Barcelona. I have sometimes gone to the cinemas on Balmes Street,” he says.
His father, a reference
Parker is one of the few African-American players who does not have any tattoos. “When I grew up, my father was a reference and he didn’t have tattoos. One of my brothers has a tattoo, but very small. I don’t think there is anything so important as to put it on your body. Better to keep the important things in your mind” , he confesses.
“My childhood was good. We didn’t have a lot of money at home, but my parents never told me that. They did talk about values. If you have good values, you can be poor, but you can feel rich at heart. This is the education that I received from my family. That’s how I grew up. We didn’t have much money, but I was never sad or upset. I was always a happy child and I always knew I had love at home,” he remembers.
2024-03-07 02:51:26
#player #tattoos #buries #memory #Mirotic
