Chapter 435 End of Time at the University 7
Jake"s friends were surprised to hear his ambitions to play in the NBA in the future, they didn"t remember seeing Jake being ambitious and talking so confidently about his dreams in the future.
In fact, they thought Jake was even too humble for someone as talented as he was, it was normal for talented people to be arrogant and say what they really wanted at times, but at university Jake always talked more about the team than his skill.
But hearing Jake say that they realized that he always knew the talent he had and in fact always thought about becoming an NBA star, they thought that Jake should stay at the university to break individual records at the university because Jake was close to achieving that.
But they agreed that it was much better to dream of breaking individual NBA records over several seasons with great teams and great players than at university if Jake managed to break just one NBA record he would go down in history as one of the best players in basketball history.
Listening to Jake talking about the Tar Heels team, they had to agree that if all the players on the current team left, it would be very difficult to win the NCAA tournament next season even if the reserve players were very good.
That"s because the team needed time to learn to play together and play as well as the current Tar Heels team, even though Jake was very good without a good team they knew he couldn"t win the NCAA tournament alone.
Of course, Jake who knew the future knew that this was not really true if he wanted he could play as SG next season and let Ed Cota play as PG, with Ademola Okulaja and Brendan Haywood on the team they would have a strong team that could fight for the NCAA tournament.
The team would depend much more on him to win but would have a better defense with Brendan Haywood, it was very risky, but it was possible, but n.o.body knew that Jake knew about the future and so he could still use it as a justification that this season all players of his team would leave the team.
Jake couldn"t say that he wanted to leave university to play for the Lakers because he was sure the Lakers" team would win 3 NBA t.i.tles in the coming seasons and Jake wanted to be on that team.
If any player were asked whether he wanted to break all individual records for College basketball or win 3 NBA t.i.tles, it was certain that players would prefer to win the NBA t.i.tle.
"Okay Jake, it"s your career and your life and we as friends have to support you in whatever you decide, we hope you will be successful in your NBA career even if you play on a weaker team."
"We will root for you and hope that we can really continue to be friends in the future even though we will all live in different cities."
"Thanks for understanding, I"m sure we can keep in touch, who knows in the future our work will allow us to make it easier for us to meet if Aaron becomes a professional American football player, William will be able to work with stocks on the stock exchange of values and Zack may become a professional marathoner in the future."
"Even if that doesn"t happen, I feel that with the internet and cell phones we can talk in the same way that we"re talking now, not to mention that when I"m playing in the NBA I will travel all over the cities to play and I can send you a ticket always and we will meet at the games."
With Jake talking like that everyone had more hope that this friends.h.i.+p between them could continue even after the end of the university if they knew that Jake would be very rich in the future they would not doubt it because Jake could send a helicopter in the future to pick up his friends.
Things always happened together for some reason, when Jake settled with his friends it was finally revealed that he would be in the NBA draft that year, it naturally meant that he would leave the Tar Heels team this season and leave the university as well.
This news took his teammates and almost all Tar Heels fans and basketball fans by surprise, even the media couldn"t wait for Jake to leave college this season to try to get into the NBA.
The first thing Jake did was to talk to his teammates who would remain at the university next season, he met Ed Cota, Brendan Haywood, Ademola Okulaja and the others to tell them why he made that decision.
Of course, Jake talked different things to his teammates and said nothing that he thought the team had no chance of winning the games without the players who left, he said to their teammates that he trusted them to increase the as long as they could the Tar Heels team record of victories.
Jake also said that he trusted that they would still make it to the final four of the NCAA tournament in the coming years and could win even without the players who left, Jake said that Okulaja would be the new leader of the team and that he trusted Ed Cota to do as well as him as the team"s PG.
Jake also said that he trusted Brendan Haywood to be one of the stars of the Tar Heels team for the next few seasons, Jake didn"t know if they believed him, but what he said was the truth.
After Jake made an appointment to chat with his friends Antawn Jamison and Vince Carter, he wanted to talk to them who would also leave the team this season because he wanted to remain friends with them even in the NBA.
"I really didn"t expect you to consider joining the NBA this season too, Jake, if I knew that my decision to go to NBA draft this season would be much easier."
"It"s true, I could never hope that the three of us would join the NBA in the same year, now we will have to try to be as successful as possible, win the NBA t.i.tle and the MVP award should be our goal."
"For sure, in fact, I decided to go to the NBA draft because I hoped you would also leave the team, if you decided to remain on the Tar Heels team I would also stay for another season, I always enjoyed playing with you."
Jake was telling the truth to Vince and Antawn, even though he thought of going to the NBA to play for the Lakers and winning 3 NBA t.i.tle, he was going one season before the NBA, he could wait another season if the two of them still stayed on the Tar Heels team.
Vince and Antawn were surprised by this because they had not thought that their departure from the team was one of the reasons Jake left the Tar Heels team that no one expected, but they were happy that Jake had this regard for them.
"I also hope that the three of us will be successful in the NBA, we have to meet for several years in the NBA all-star game, Hahaha, I really hope we all managed to win an NBA t.i.tle and an MVP award of the season."
"You will definitely win the MVP at least once, Jake, but to win the NBA t.i.tle we will have to be lucky to play on a good team too, but we cannot play on that team"s reserve, we have to have a lot of playing time."
"You two are really talented, I"m sure your skills will be recognized by the teams and I hope you will be recognized by the fans too, we won the NCAA tournament twice, our name is already in history."
The three were talking and Jake couldn"t help remembering what he knew, he played personally with Vince Carter and Antawn Jamison, he knew he could always count on games with Jamison for attacking and rebounding because Jamison is a very talented player.
With Vince Carter, he also knew he could count, especially for the more complicated plays like making an alley-oop, but between the two he counted more in games with Antawn Jamison.
But Jake knew that in the past only Carter was recognized as a talented player and was chosen 8 times for the all-star game, this showed that Vince was recognized as a very talented and beloved player by the fans.
But Antawn did not have that recognition from the fans, Jake thought that this was a great injustice, certainly, he thought that Carter deserved everything he got as a professional, but Jamison also deserved more recognition from fans and basketball fans.
He was like Carter, a player who scored more than 20,000 points and still managed 8,000 rebounds in his career, that made Jake sad thinking about the future of his friend, in fact, the future of the two made him sad because Jake thought they deserved to win an NBA t.i.tle.
Jake didn"t know if with his knowledge and talent he could do something about it, but seeing his friends so talented that they didn"t get the recognition they deserved, Jake decided that he would try to do something about it in the future.
"I think a lot of things matter a lot to a professional NBA basketball player, getting good stats like scoring a lot, catching a lot of rebounds, making a lot of a.s.sists."
"Earning a good salary is also important for a basketball player, winning the MVP award for the best player can also be important, being recognized by fans as well, but the most important thing for me is winning an NBA t.i.tle, what do you think about that?"
"Hahaha, I don"t know if it"s the most important, I still wanted to have a good salary and get good statistics than to be a reserve to win an NBA t.i.tle, but I think it"s one of the most important things and what I want most for me."
"Antawn is right, I think we have to have a good salary, recognition from fans, good statistics too, but I also think that winning an NBA t.i.tle is really important."