Peja Stojakovic was playing pro basketball as early as 14 years old. He had escaped his hometown in East Croatia as a young teen to escape the Yugoslav Wars. He played a couple years for Red Star Belgrade before signing a 5 year contract with PAOK of the Greek League where he would excel for the next few years. He would earn praise from fellow countryman Vlade Divac and even NBA hall of famer Dominique Wilkins, before he ever played a game in America. His talents were recognized and he was drafted 14th overall in the legendary 1996 NBA Draft, just one pick after Kobe Bryant. He would return to Greece to fulfill his contract obligations, but would make his NBA debut during the lockout shortened 1999 season where he would join a new look Sacramento Kings team featuring Chris Webber, Vlade Divac and Jason Williams. Stojakovic would improve steadily and so would the Kings as they would acquire Doug Christie and Mike Bibby to complete their “Greatest show on court” offense of the early 2000s. Stojakovic was a member of the Kings team that was robbed in the 2002 Western Conference Finals, but people forget he was injured for a lot of that postseason. From 2002-2004 he was an all star every year and would finish as a top 2 scorer in the league in 2004 along with being 4th in MVP voting. The Kings broke up pretty quickly after Webber’s ACL tear in the 2003 playoffs, and eventually Stojakovic would be shipped to the Indiana Pacers for Ron Artest.
He would have a brief stint in Indiana with Jermaine O’Neal before being acquired by the New Orleans Hornets where he would have some good, but injury riddled years alongside Chris Paul, David West and Tyson Chandler as he would be a key piece in the Hornets franchise record 56 win season in 2008. By 2011 Stojakovic was bouncing around teams, but found himself signed to the Dallas Mavericks to finish off the second half of the regular season and for their legendary playoff run, where he would have a couple of vintage performances en route to helping Dirk Nowitzki, Jason Kidd and the Dallas Mavericks win their first NBA championship. And Stojakovic would retire as one of the best European players of all time, who in his prime was a complete player and not just a shooter; but his shooting was still elite as he would even become to first European to win an All-Star weekend competition when he won the 3 point shootout in 2002. But his overall career tends to get overlooked as he seen as just a shooter nowadays, when he was so much more than that…
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30 сен 2024
