[分享] Finest person I've ever been around …

看板Kings (沙加緬度國王)作者santabrelai時間15年前 (2010/10/07 23:14)推噓3(3推 0噓 0→)

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http://0rz.tw/USZJT He is not yet eligible to claim a spot in the international wing of the Basketball Hall of Fame, but you suspect that Vlade Divac won't have to wait through too many more Septembers. 他還沒有在國際籃球名人堂裡獲得一個位置，但你可以預期 Vlade Divac不用等得太久。 Not when you could start in Portland and scour the globe and still struggle to find a bigger trailblazer in the game. 除了在波特蘭之外，你應該很難找到另一個比他更大隻的籃球拓荒者。 The résumé stands up well nearly five years since he last played, no matter what you think of his famed, uh, defensive theatrics. Divac's huge, soft hands entrenched him as Europe's first successful long-term export to the NBA. He is one of just four players ever to amass at least 13,000 points, 9,000 rebounds, 3,000 assists and 1,500 blocks. His name likewise answers this rather significant trivia question: Who is the only player in league history to be traded for Kobe Bryant? 距離上次出賽已經有五年多了，不管你對 Divac影帝般的演出怎麼想，他巨大而柔軟的手段確立了他是第一位成功歐洲輸出作品。他是僅有的四位球員能達到 13000分、9000 籃板、3000助攻、1500火鍋。由下列的問題可以證明他的身價：誰是歷史上唯一一位被拿來交換Kobe Bryant的球員？ Hoop historians will put that name right up there with Bill Walton and Arvydas Sabonis in the pantheon of slick-passing big men and remember him even more readily as one of the groundbreakers in the NBA's globalization. It was precisely 20 years ago that Divac began to break down the barriers that helped make it possible for Russian billionaire Mikhail Prokhorov to reach an agreement this week to buy the New Jersey Nets and become the league's first foreign majority owner. Two decades later, meanwhile, Divac has convinced countless countrymen that he will wind up serving as president of Serbia someday, such is his post-NBA devotion to humanitarian causes. 籃球史學家們在排列優秀傳球長人時，總會提到他與Bill Walton、Arvydas Sabonis ，他使用地板傳球的技巧真是出神入化。 Divac的成功帶進了文化交流，所以在他加盟NBA 的二十年後，我們看到了史上第一位外籍老闆。而退休後的 Divac也承認有許多國人都希望他有朝一日成為塞爾維亞的總統，因為他的博愛形象已深入人心。 Eligibility for the Hall remains another two years away, in 2011, after five full seasons in retirement, but Vlade has already scored the ultimate stamp of approval from The Logo himself. 雖然距離名人堂的票選還有兩年的時間（必須確定退休五年）， Divac因自身形象所獲得的支持票卻已超標。 Asked recently about the pioneering center he drafted in 1989, Jerry West said: "He's the finest person I've ever been around in my life. 被問到這位他1989年所選進的中鋒時，Jerry West回答：「他是我一生中遇過最好的人。」 "Ever." 「最好的！」 Bigger names and more prodigious talents have certainly blipped in and out of a lifetime so closely associated with the NBA that West's silhouette was the inspiration for the league's insignia. The reality is that Divac played in only one All-Star Game in 16 seasons. But it's also true that no endorsement will mean more to Divac, who, to this day, refers to the Lakers' former top executive as "my favorite man in the NBA." West這位 NBA標誌人物和太多偉大球員有過連結。雖然 Divac生涯十六季只有入選過一次明星賽，不過有了West這一句的背書，他也不需要太多其他的證明。因為他是這位前湖人名將最喜歡的NBA人。 Not even the sting of West's informing him back in the summer of 1996 that L.A. had no choice but to trade him to Charlotte for the rights to Bryant -- and the salary-cap space that ultimately helped the Lakers sign Shaquille O'Neal -- could dent Divac's regard for his old boss. Divac insists, furthermore, that no bitterness lingers from the Sacramento Kings' oh-so-close failure to get past the Shaq-and-Kobe Lakers in 2002, or from the detractors who ignore West's gushing assessments and prefer to remember Divac's flopping more than his passing. 雖然在1996的選秀會上他被湖人交易給黃蜂，只為了換來Bryant的選秀權以及給Shaq 的薪資空間，2002年又以如此近的差距被湖人所擊敗，Divac 卻堅持他對於老東家沒有什麼不好的印象。 He's too busy and giddy, at 41, to dwell on the negativity, fully engaged in his new job as president of the Serbian Olympic Committee and still reveling in the afterglow of the ceremony in late March when the Kings retired his No. 21. 他實在是太忙了，41歲的 Divac沒有時間消極，他現在正以塞爾維亞奧委會主席的身份奔波，還剛參加完三月國王為他舉辦的球衣退休儀式。 Fresh off a brief return to the floor for a legends trip to Korea and the Philippines with Dominique Wilkins, Tim Hardaway and Robert Horry, Divac has also been helping to organize the forthcoming American tour of his original club team back home. Partizan Belgrade is scheduled to play two exhibition games against an all-star team led by former Kings teammates Scot Pollard and Mateen Cleaves during a weeklong stay in Chicago and Detroit that starts Thursday, followed by Partizan's two preseason games in early October against NBA teams: Denver on Oct. 3 and Phoenix on Oct. 6. 才剛與 Dominique Wilkins、Tim Hardaway、Robert Horry等人結束一趟訪問南韓的行程。Divac 也還在替他的初隻效力球隊歸劃美國賽行程。Partizan Belgrade 將會在芝加哥與底特律和他的前國王隊隊友Scot Pollard及Mateen Cleaves所率領的明星隊打兩場表演賽。接下來在十月Partizan還有兩場與NBA 球隊的季前賽，分別是十月三號對金塊及十月六號對太陽。 In honor of Partizan's U.S. visit and the 20th anniversary of his rookie season -- with a bow to the No. 12 that Divac was wearing the first time I saw him play, alongside Drazen Petrovic, Toni Kukoc and Dino Radja for a still-unified Yugoslavia on the best team you probably never saw -- ESPN.com has collected a dozen remembrances and updates from Divac's life to fete one of the sport's most heralded ambassadors. 為了替Partizan訪美造勢，以及他的第二十個新秀紀念日。 Divac將會再度穿上十二號球衣（這是我第一次看見他時所穿的號碼，也是Drazen Petrovic、Toni Kukoc、Dino Radja 等人所組成的最強南拉斯夫隊。）ESPN也收集了十幾個 Divac球員生涯最值得記憶的時刻，來招待這位運動大使先驅。 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Hooray for Hollywood The legend, as it is written in Lakers lore, holds that West went around the room on the night of the 1989 draft asking every team official present to submit the name of the player he should take with the No. 26 overall pick. None of his basketball people tossed out "Divac," but that's the name West called in to New York, having kept the secret from his own staff. 讓我們將故事由1989年說起，在選秀會時，West詢問了每一隻球隊的總管，他應該在 26順位選擇誰？沒有任何人回答 Divac，但這正是West在台上宣布的名字，他連對自已的團隊都保守了秘密。 http://a.espncdn.com/photo/2009/0407/nba_g_divac-lakers_200.jpg

One of the greatest passing big men the game has ever seen. West says it's all true. "There hadn't been a lot of foreign players in the NBA draft at that point," West recalls. "But I had watched him play the Celtics over there [in the McDonald's Open with his national team], and I just felt this guy, because he had played in international competition, was ready to play right away. You wondered if he was going to work hard enough to succeed over here and he wasn't the most gifted player athletically, but his hands were like Super Glue and you could see that he could do all the little things. He was the guy for us." 「當時的外國球員還不多，但當我看完他對抗塞爾提克的比賽（麥當勞公開賽），我覺得就是他了，他有許多國際比賽的經驗，讓他能夠馬上上場。你會懷疑這個球員是否能努力獲得成功，他也不是最有天賦的球員，但他有一雙像膠水般的手，他也能做好所有的小事情，他就是我們的人選。」West回憶說。 Yet West also concedes that he immediately had to fight the urge to second-guess himself upon greeting Divac and wife Ana at the airport, where the 21-year-old's notoriously ragged look was even rougher than usual after all the international travel. With Divac carrying two duffel bags -- and with his trademark beard in full sprout -- West doesn't deny having some what-have-I-done convulsions. 不過West也承認當他前往機場迎接Divac及他的老婆Ana時，不禁開始懷疑起自已的決定。這位二十一歲的球員破爛的穿著在經過長途飛行後使他更顯狼狽。他們全部的行李只有兩個粗呢包， Divac的招牌鬍子也亂七八糟。當下的West也有一種「我到底做了些什麼？」的感受。 "But the one thing I could tell right away," West says, "is that there was an unbelievable warmth that just radiated from him." 「但那時我也感覺到一股不可置信的溫暖。」West說。 Dropping all the way to the penultimate pick of the first round, when he thought he had a shot to go as high as No. 5 in what turned out to be one of the most ridiculed drafts in league history, worked out for Divac as well as it clicked for West. He admits that he put his name into the draft thinking that "I would go to the NBA for a couple years, get strong and come back home." He came to America speaking no English and never having seen a live NBA game on television. He wound up with the legendary West as his boss, Pat Riley as his first coach and Magic Johnson as his mentor. Divac 原本預想自已最高能以第五順位中選，卻沒想到自已一路跌到第一輪的倒數第二順位，不過這也讓West有了機會。 Divac承認自已一開始對 NBA沒有太多想法：「我可能進去個幾年，變得強壯，然後回家。」抵達美國的這一天，他還不會說英文，一場電視比賽都沒看過。但他非常興奮能當傳奇人物West旗下的一員，以及Pat Riley、Magic分別擔任他的良師益友。 Pervis Ellison might have been the No. 1 overall pick that year, but Divac won the lottery. Pervis Ellison是當年的選秀狀元，可是抽中了樂透的卻是Divac。 Says Vlade: "If I went somewhere else, no English, no Magic, no Pat, it could have been [a] disaster." 「如果我去了其他地方，不會英文，又沒有Magic、Pat的幫忙，那一定是災難一場。」Vlade說。待續.... -- 這篇翻得很亂，感謝並希望幫忙指正，或著文句不通順處也可以告知。如果有人願意接力翻譯，也非常感謝，不過為了避免撞刊，還請您推文告知。 -- ※ 發信站: 批踢踢實業坊(ptt.cc) ◆ From: 122.116.219.191 ※ 編輯: santabrelai 來自: 122.116.219.191 (10/07 23:14)