Nowitzki Discusses Opting Out & Retiring

Shapecity · Sep 28, 2008

DALLAS — The Olympic rings proudly shaved into the side of his head have faded, and the goose bumps that rose as high as the Beijing night sky while carrying the German flag have finally returned to their subterranean roots.

After a travel-logged and triumphant summer, Dallas Mavericks power forward Dirk Nowitzki is back in Big D. The 7-footer notched his first workout Thursday at American Airlines Center in preparation for his 11th training camp, which starts Tuesday.

Expressing optimism and intrigue about the upcoming season, Nowitzki, who turned 30 in June, also turned philosophical, sharing interesting perspectives on getting older and his career, including how much longer it might last and where it might end.

With three years left on his contract, Nowitzki repeatedly talked about gunning for a championship in these final three seasons and then, well, possibly hanging it up after 14 seasons, at the age of 33.

Here’s some of what he had to say:

Is that how you are viewing your NBA career, three more years? I’m 30 now; I crossed that big hurdle — which was a little emotional by the way — this summer. I always was kind of the young talent and now I’ve crossed that line. We’ll just have to see how these next couple of years go. I would love to finish my career, obviously, in Dallas. I’ve always said that. Hopefully we can win the championship here in these three years and everything will be great. If not, I think we all have to keep our eyes and ears open to what’s going on.

After the 2010-11 season you will turn 33. Do you

envision yourself retiring even though you likely would have more solid seasons to come? I think the worst thing that athletes can do is play too long and at the end look slow and don’t look right and they lose some of their reputation.

I want to still play when it’s fun, but when I have to get up in the morning, everything hurts and I have to go to work, if

that’s my mentality, then I’d rather quit and do something

else. Obviously, as you get older you start thinking about

other things, too ... stuff like family comes up over the years and we’ll see what happens there.

Are you planning then not to negotiate an extension next year and to enter your final season in 2010-11 without a deal? I don’t want to commit until I’m 35, 36 or whatever and then I really don’t want to play that long. But, saying that now, I really don’t know. I think everything’s kind of out in the open. We’ll have to see how we play this year. Hopefully, we’re going to bring some of the fun back and we’ll just have to see how that works.

You said you were happy the U.S. won the gold medal because it reaffirmed the NBA as the best league in the world. With some NBA players bolting for European leagues, would you consider playing on your home continent? There’s one big club in Germany, in Berlin, called ALBA Berlin, and they’ve been asking me every year. Actually, the owner’s dream is to have me in their uniform once before I retire, and I’m sure he’s going to do everything he can to make that happen before my career is over. And really, on that subject, too, I leave everything open. ... There’s so many athletes here in the U.S., it’s amazing, this game is so fast. And in Europe, this summer I saw it again, the game is slower, not as many athletes, so I’ll be able to play a lot longer over there than I am over here, so we’ll just have to wait and see. I’ll play here as long as it’s fun and I can. If I still want to play and compete at a high level I can always go over there and play.

What do you make of Josh Howard’s situation? Interesting summer, yeah. He’s not a bad guy. I’ve been playing with him for five years now. He just sometimes says the wrong things at the wrong time sometimes. But knowing him for that long, he’s a good guy. People are trying to make him a bad guy now. I can for sure say that he’s fun to be around, he’s a good kid, he cares; just sometimes he needs to learn to control himself and just keep some stuff to himself and he’ll be all right.

You made it clear that the playoff collapse against Golden State tainted winning the MVP award. After a full year, do you have a different perspective? That trophy is sitting at home at my mom’s, so I saw it basically all summer; every time I eat it was right there with a huge picture with my suit on right next to it. I look at it this way, that’s something that nobody can ever take away from me and it was an amazing accomplishment, obviously the first European to win it, and really something to be proud of. But, it will always be combined with that first-round collapse.
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Source: Star Telegram

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Nowitzki Discusses Opting Out & Retiring

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Nowitzki Discusses Opting Out & Retiring

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