“I want to generate excitement and show changes from the beginning in Brooklyn”
The new Nets coach does not forget his origins: “I am the same boy who went out to the Badalona court to play”
BARCELONA, 30 Abr. (EUROPA PRESS) –
Basketball coach Jordi Fernández, who will take charge of the NBA’s Brooklyn Nets next season, assured that the important thing is not to have reached the bench as ‘head coach’ but to “remain” in a “respected” project, with the willingness to stay for many years and develop an idea that is clear to him and whose origins are in Badalona, in the grassroots basketball that he learned about as a child.
“For me they are always steps forward, this step has more impact and seems to be bigger. But for me it is not at all an end of the road or the end of the road. It is an honor and I am excited, but the important thing is not to arrive but to maintain it. I have to do a respected project,” he said in a talk with Spanish media in which Europa Press was present.
The one from Badalona, 41 years old and who next year will experience his first season as head coach in the NBA, being the first Spaniard and the third European in history to achieve this, is clear that “it is not at all the end of the journey” but a project that makes him “excited”. “I have the goal of staying there for many years and having a very competitive group,” he added.
And he “never” set the goal of being an NBA coach. “I can’t lie, it was never my goal. But I was excited to learn, at a time in my life when I lived and studied in the Netherlands I learned a lot outside my country, outside my comfort zone. My mind opened, I went to Norway, to Oklahoma and Las Vegas. My enthusiasm for learning led me to this opportunity and I didn’t think twice and jumped on the train. It has been a beautiful process, with ups and downs, and I have learned from all of this.” , celebrated.
“I wouldn’t be here if I hadn’t had my ‘superpowers’, because we all have ours, which in my case is having a European background and origin. But just being European is not enough, you have to adapt and learn. This mix is the which has given me success in general. The NBA is very global in every sense, as a business. It is open to bringing things from outside and I have been the beneficiary, I have adapted and I have tried to contribute to all the clubs I have been in. “, he stated.
In his Brooklyn Nets he will want to “generate excitement.” “I want to show changes from the beginning, it is important. In the NBA there are no impossible benches or perfect benches. In Brooklyn there is a very large market, with an owner who provides all the necessary means, with an excellent organization, with a general manager in Sean Marks who has a lot of experience and has proven to do things very well,” he highlighted.
“The only thing that is obvious to me is the illusion of being able to have an exciting project because comparing ourselves to the Knicks does not make any sense, we have to create our own identity. A lot of respect, obviously, towards our neighbors and the rivalry “I think this is the most beautiful thing, that it is with respect towards the players, towards the other organization and obviously every time you play with them try to win,” he added.
WOULD LIKE TO CONTINUE BEING A FIBA TECHNICIAN
Jordi Fernández will combine his position as head coach of the Brooklyn franchise with that of Canada coach, which he already held and with whom he has a contract until the end of the Paris 2024 Olympic Games. But on his mind is the ability to continue being a FIBA coach as well. of NBA.
“I have a commitment to Canada until the Games. For me the most important thing in these previous months is to structure the work in Brooklyn, the summer league and the work until August. And also to face the preparation for the Games, which is in process all year. I am very comfortable because I believe that everything will work in an organized way and we will have a very special group to aspire to everything in the Games,” he commented.
“Then I don’t know anymore, my commitment is until the end of the Games and if it weren’t for Canada I wouldn’t be in Brooklyn, I want to be grateful for the opportunity to be in the Games as a coach, which for me is a dream. I would like to continue training in FIBA but it is not something I can decide right now. It is an ideal experience that I have learned a lot, but it is a two-part thing and I cannot add more to the fact that I have a contract until the end of the Games,” he explained.
On the other hand, he assured that despite this media boom he remains the same. “I am the same person and the same child who went out to the court in the Badalona neighborhood to play basketball, who went to school with his friends. I have been gone for many years but I maintain contact with my lifelong friends and family. For me it is important that I be the same person. We evolve in different ways, but being at home brings me comfort and that means not stopping being who you are from the beginning,” he said.
As for the pressure of reaching an NBA bench or the vertigo of seeing yourself at the top, he doesn’t feel that way “for many reasons.” “I am very excited to learn and I am excited about challenges, if I took it any other way it would not help me take the next step forward. Nowadays, the media and social networks can generate a stir but for me it is feeling what I have felt always; coach. It’s what I have learned from being from Badalona and being a coach. It is the same now as when I was at the base. Now it is a different role and I do it with players with specific skills, for me the vertigo is more. well an illusion. The pressure is obvious in this job but it is part of it and if you don’t like the pressure it is not the job you should choose,” he said.