As Heat regain stride, Giannis doesn’t want to hear about Doc or wrist injury
· Yahoo Sports
MIAMI — As he finally finished dressing nearly 90 minutes after the Heat defeated the Utah Jazz on Tuesday night at the Delta Center, Giannis Antetokounmpo made clear he wanted to move beyond the drama.
Such as the drama surrounding his team’s uneven start.
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Such as the drama surrounding comments from former NBA coach Doc Rivers about his basketball IQ and team loyalty.
Such as the drama about the sprained right wrist that had Antetokounmpo questionable 90 minutes before Tuesday night’s game.
Instead, the Heat prized offseason acquisition wanted to put the focus and keep the focus on one thing.
“We won five of the last seven games,” he said after closing with 30 points and 11 rebounds against the shorthanded Jazz in a closer-than-it-should-have-been 115-109 victory over the Jazz. “So it’s quiet. Keep it that way. Keep on doing our job.”
Actually, earlier in the night it actually was quite harrowing, as what was a 23-point Heat lead earlier in the game and a 12-point lead with 3:43 to play was reduced to five with 47.7 seconds to play.
No matter, after an 0-4 start and the 10-day, five-game trip that ended with the victory over the Jazz, there at least could be a brief exhale before the Heat face the Cleveland Cavaliers on Friday night at Kaseya Center to open a five-game homestand.
“For people that have been in the NBA, at the end of the road trip you kind of like, kind of crave your own bed, your family, your city, your fans,” Antetokounmpo said, the last of the Heat players to dress. “We’ve been 10 days on the road. So I think it’s one of the toughest games that you got to play because at the same time, you have a game, but you know that in less than 12 hours you’re going to be home. So you just got to be mentally locked in.
“I feel like for the majority of the game we were.”
There was a point when it appeared Antetokounmpo would miss his first game with the Heat, the uncertainty such that coach Erik Spoelstra said he was prepared to have Nikola Jovic start in Antetokounmpo’s place.
“He’ll continue to get treatment on that,” Spoelstra said, as his team headed into its two-day break. “I don’t think even if he just rested that something like that will just miraculously get better overnight, it’s something that he’s able to play through right now. And we’ll monitor him.”
Those words proved to be even more discussion about the wrist sprain than Antetokounmpo chose to entertain.
“I’m not concerned at all. If I was, I wouldn’t play the game,” he said, wearing wrist protection after the game, but without a similar wrap during the games. “Obviously I’ve taken some bad hits, some bad falls. But at the end of the day, I tend to not whine about things or tend not to talk about things.
“If I’m going to suit up, I’m going to suit up and help the team win the game. If you play the game, there’s no reason for you to talk about injuries. I played the game. It’s over with.”
Apparently over with as well, at least from Antetokounmpo’s standpoint, is the kerfuffle that Rivers created during a podcast last week.
That’s when Rivers, who coached Antetokounmpo in Milwaukee, said of the 10-time All-Star’s final days with the Bucks, “Giannis wanted out, but he was a Buck. And he didn’t want to be the bad guy. He wanted (management) and those guys to say, ‘We’re trading you,’ instead of him asking for a trade. To me, that was the game that was being played.”
Rivers also said on that podcast, “He has this great passing ability, but he doesn’t necessarily have this super IQ at the same time. It’s really a strange thing, and he really has one way: downhill, force, force. Every play, he wants to force it.”
That was followed up by Rivers telling ESPN he had texted Antetokounmpo an apology, offering somewhat of a retraction, quoted by ESPN as saying, “I hate this and feel bad about it. I apologize for the distraction. I’m not trying to be one.”
Asked if he had received such a text from Rivers, Antetokounmpo said after the victory over the Jazz that it should remain a private matter.
“I don’t know if he texted me. I haven’t looked at my phone,” he said. “But even if he texted me, as I said, that’s private. That’s between me and him. And it will always be that way.”
It was clear that Antetokounmpo’s goal was to move on, even with it possible that Rivers will serve as an NBA analyst on upcoming Heat broadcasts on the network.
“He made those comments. He had those quotes. You guys gotta go ask him what he meant,” Antetokounmpo said of Rivers’ apology interview with ESPN. “If you feel like he has to clarify, you know, that’s on him. It’s not on me.
“Conversations that have been taking place between me, my coaches, my teammates, my wife, my best friends, tend to be private. I never share them in the media. That’s why it’s between me and them.”