By Philip O’Connor
STOCKHOLM (Reuters) – Swedish former NBA player Jonas Jerebko is still looking for answers about his future over a year after being suspended by his country’s basketball association following his decision to join CSKA Moscow in the wake of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
Jerebko regrets his decision to join a club in Russia, which calls its actions in Ukraine a “special military operation”, and said in hindsight it was a mistake but so far he has been met by silence from the Swedish Basketball Association (SBL).
“I hadn’t played basketball for almost a year and a half and I felt like I had no other offers,” Jerebko told Reuters in an interview in central Stockholm.
“I got an offer from them (CSKA Moscow) and I took it. At that time, I was only thinking about basketball – it went completely wrong. I regret it now, and if I could go back in time, I would not have done it.”
The 36-year-old was drafted 39th overall in the 2009 NBA draft by the Detroit Pistons before playing for the Boston Celtics and Utah Jazz and was part of the Golden State Warriors team that lost the 2019 NBA Finals to the Toronto Raptors.
Jerebko then joined BC Khimki in Russia until January 2021, and it was in an effort to get his NBA career back on track that he accepted a short-term contract with CSKA on March 30, 2022.
With several other foreign players leaving CSKA due to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the 6’10” power forward was brought in to shore up the team, but once again Jerebko found himself on the losing side.
CSKA threw away a 3-1 lead in the VTB League finals series, eventually losing 4-3 to Zenit St Petersburg, and Jerebko waved away suggestions that money played a part in his decision to join the Moscow club.
“I’ve played basketball professionally since I was 18, with my last two months in CSKA. If money played a part? Absolutely not,” he said.
Nonetheless, the decision to sign for CSKA came at a price – one day after he signed, the Swedish association announced that he was suspended from the national team and since then he has been out in the cold.
“I had tunnel vision in terms of trying to get back to the NBA, I had no other offers so I took this one. At the same time, I don’t want to blame that – I’m to blame,” Jerebko said.
“Nobody else is to blame – it was my fault, you make your bed, you lie in it, as the saying goes. But we all make mistakes, we’re all human.”
ANGRY FANS
Jerebko says he understands the reaction of Swedish fans who were angry at his decision to play in Russia but after over a year out of the game and with no other offers on the table, he felt he did not have a choice.
The sharp-shooting Swede says he asked the basketball association to wait before deciding his fate but that they suspended him almost immediately and that he has tried to make contact with them to see where he stands now.
“It’s sad but I understand their side too (but) not contacting me for a year and a half and not getting any answers is tough,” Jerebko says, adding that he had made two attempts to talk to the association about the situation without success.
The SBL welcomed Jerebko’s acknowledgement that he had made a mistake joining CSKA Moscow.
“This not something he has expressed to us, either when the contract began and when he was informed of the consequences it would have, or in a meeting he had with our chairperson Susanne Jidesten in March 2023,” SBL general secretary Fredrik Joulamo told Reuters in an email.
“Other than that, we are not going to communicate with Jonas via the media. He knows how he can reach us and we are happy to make ourselves available for a conversation with him, precisely as we have done during this whole process,” he added.
Jerebko is not quite ready to quit the game and would like the chance to give something back to Swedish basketball.
“I think it’s up to them (the association),” he said when asked whose responsibility it was to sort things out.
“I contacted them in November, I contacted them via social media and I have yet to get any answers.”
Having spent the past weekend at a basketball camp in Oslo in neighbouring Norway, Jerebko feels that he still has a lot to offer the game in Scandinavia after 10 seasons in the NBA.
“Seeing young kids and how much they appreciate the effort, that one cares about them and gives them tips, the love has come back a little bit,” he said.
“But I know I can play another few years if I’m given the chance.”
(Reporting by Philip O’Connor; Editing by Ken Ferris)
