Also a special thanks to my family, the former General Manager of the Adelaide 36ers Ben Fitzsimons and Austin Walton my agent who all sent me messages via twitter or email or phone calls to console me and had to continuously warn me to calm down while we were experiencing this whole debacle unfold. Honestly this is too may variables of a story to really get into without doing the justice to telling EVERY IMPORT PLAYERS story besides mine to justify the uncrediblity of the managers because looking back it was humorous. I am actually proud of myself and the other guys that were involved, for nothing drastic happening out there with one of them people (It would of been bad getting into an assault with a manager because they were treating us like unworthy cattle & obviously it would been a career damager). You guys are 1-8 last place with no hope and you had the audacity to say that we had to be better than your players just so you didn't want to pay our little salaries. lol c'mon buddy?!? Why make up stuff to say just for that simple reason. I had to pass TWO PHYSICALS in America (one by 91' USA Olympic Women's' Soccer Trainer Dr. Glasson One of the best in the state of Virginia) I paid for X-rays, MRI, physical therapy, police reports... etc out of my pocket to come out there you guys really are a joke! If you guys wanna spread false rumors out there that I was sent home from failed physical or whatever it won't be good for your guys character because it was just another lie you guys are living by just not to pay players along with bad paperwork (Jarrid), who knows for (Larry), the Croatian guys that left before we even arrived & do not think we don't know you guys are late on payments 2 months with even the Slovak guys. Your track record speaks for itself. I may sound bitter but How would anyone feel if you and other guys are being told that you were getting evicted out of the hotel in the morning that the team paid for and they are trying to justify that they are not responsible for your way home and the airport was 3 hours away!!! Are you serous?!?
A guy from California named Larry took a train and bus to the airport and booked his own $800 flight out of there himself. Another player Jarrid bought his own ticket and we luckily were still there together for our agent to scrape up a ride because they acted like they were not gonna even get us to the airport... "I mean it was totally CRAZY we felt as in a movie scene or something for the first time in my life. I thought it was a Halloween prank or bad dream that was becoming reality!!!"
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| Walking to twice-a-day Practices/ Everywhere in Freezing weather Everyday! |
PSA Note to Manager Jiri,
if you are now reading this:
(that lying guy that sold all of us players dreams of coming to a well ran professioal club and switching face under that other fake Mark Cuban, coming on the court during games, snake manager/ coward that acts like he doesn't speak English when confronted that obviously is the mastermind and your boss. He's lucky we weren't really trapped out there like he warned us at the hotel let me tell you, playing with grown men like that. It would've turned out ugly if we had saw him afterwards real talk. I applaud you by ultimately doing the right thing by getting us a 35euro young boy driver out of there and to the airport. Oh yeah, We did our background check and know everything about you man. PS stop texting me I don't know where your jerseys are so lose my number please.)
Honestly I do not blame you entirely for it all because you seem to have no power in that organization and you seem like a man with some morals and integrity when we were face to face but I can honestly say that if any of you people tried to pull those tricks you guys do there in any other circumstances (In America, or any other Country with an Union or some form of respected governing body) and your club was monitored, I believe your whole club would be audited or whoever makes the decisions would be fired without question because you guys are simply disgusting business people. To sum up the whole experience one game they actually sat out all of the Import players out of a game giving all types of excuses to why we could not participate just so they would not have to pay us we heard later on. I am not 100% positive of what the final outcome of that situation was but it was obviously a shady one. Honestly the guy my heart really goes out to is Jarrid Famous, a 6"10 talented young big guy that we came out there together to that hell hole and it was his first experience with overseas basketball after some other bigger deals were passed on earlier in the summer. All due respect to NCAA college basketball experience and the structure in the way things were done it has been a wake up call in Europe to understand what time it is to really grind in this industry. I say all that to say for him to experience the worse of the worse on his first go around it was totally unfair because he was saying he may never return after such a shock to the system. I had to constantly tell him that it was just a fluke deal and to not believe that this was a normal situation because it wasn't. I was so humbled because I was so hungry to play anywhere at that point after a whole year off so I was trying not to complain. I have been to multiple countries and seen good and decent situations but honestly this place shouldn't even had been considered itself a professional sports team because it was definitely "Unprofessional"(From not paying guys till months behind schedule, living conditions, just obviously many cut corners that was new to myself). I try to find a positive at the end of the day and I feel that the opportunity to go and practice again twice a day and get my feet wet playing in the games it was what I expected it would feel like the hype and excitement of competition. I was able to gauge myself with the other guys and honestly even through I was not all the way back I was at a respectable level, I could had easily averaged 13-15 points a game there and could of got more reps and timing under my belt, which was the whole objective of going there anyway. Also my wife was able to get a free trip out of it as well surprisingly and we were able to tour another European city which was cool sort of like a paid basketball tour so all in all it was not all bad, that part was actually kinda cool.
Until next time I post something as always thanks for reading about this experience. I'm back home safely and preparing to face the next challenge whenever it comes along. Peace & Love
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