Jared Jordan Shifts Focus From NBA Dream To Europe

¹²³ · Aug 3, 2009

HARTFORD - The dream was to be in the NBA by this point, and Jared Jordan, so close a few times, has spent the last two years pursuing that goal.

After being selected by the Clippers in the second round of the 2007 draft, then failing to earn a roster spot after a trade to the Knicks, Jordan spent a year in Lithuania — where the pay was good, but the basketball was not. Jordan was stuck behind former Oklahoma guard Hollis Price and generally unhappy overseas.

So last season, after training camp with the Hornets, the point guard from Hartford who led the nation in assists as a junior and senior at Marist played in what felt like another country, Rio Grande, Texas.

"Basically, it was like Mexico," Jordan said of his time with the Valley Vipers of the NBA Development League — where the basketball was good, but the pay was not.

So now, after playing in an NBA summer league with the Warriors, Jordan has shifted gears mentally.

Speaking Saturday before scoring 34 points for All Axxess in a 120-117 loss to Doc Hurley All-Stars at the Greater Hartford Pro-Am, he said he's excited for the next step. He has signed a one-year contract to play for Bonn Telecom in Germany, a team with a good reputation in a good league that pays players such as Jordan more than $200,000. With a pro-rated contract in the Development League last year, Jordan made less than $20,000.

"For the first time in my life I really feel like I'm ready for something like this," Jordan said. "I'm just ready to get out and go. The NBA is always the dream, but there does come a point where you have to focus on a career in Europe. You just have to find the right situation."

Jordan says he'll have that in Bonn. The nomadic life of a professional athlete is still trying — Jordan's parents are still in Hartford, as well as so many friends — but his girlfriend will be moving to Germany with him. And "The Magician," as he was known in college, is going with a healthy mind-set.

This is the job. This is the lifestyle. Jordan says that while he would love a call from an NBA team, he doesn't see himself attending any more training camps in the next few years. Being on top of the basketball world is a thrill, but not so much when that experience entails such limited playing time and a tenuous, at best, spot on any team.

"I'm going to start building my career overseas," Jordan said. "Then, who knows, maybe something can happen like what happened to Will Solomon. You go away for a while, spend a few years getting better, and you end up in the NBA."
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