Paul Millsap doesn’t want to think about facing the team that he played for the first seven seasons of his NBA career. Not yet, anyway.
One can get emotional – and that’s not always a good thing for a basketball player.
The Hawks host the Jazz Friday, the first meeting between Millsap and the team that renounced his rights last summer and allowed him to become an unrestricted free agent. The Hawks made the power forward an off-season priority and signed him to a two-year, $19 million deal.
“I don’t know yet,” Millsap said Thursday when asked about his reaction to facing his old team. “Maybe it will be a game-time decision. I’ll wait until I get there and see what happens. It’s always tough going against your old team.
“I don’t want to (think about it). Once I get to thinking about it that’s when all the emotions come out. I’ll try to treat it as any other game.”
DeMarre Carroll, who also signed with the Hawks as a free agent this summer, spent the previous two seasons with the Jazz. The small forward also said he will treat the game as any other. He has played against former teams before. Millsap has not.
“My biggest advice is to play as hard as you can,” Carroll said. “You are going to make mistakes because of the jitters of playing against your former team. If you play really hard you will overcome all the bad that might happen. …
“You get out here and you think about ‘Oh, I have to hit this shot or do this.’ If you just play hard it will take your mind away from all that. It’s easier said than done. This is what we get paid to do – go out there and play the game of basketball.”
Millsap was drafted by the Jazz in the second round of the 2006 NBA Draft, the No. 47 overall selection. He appeared in 540 games with the Jazz and averaged 12.4 points and 7.0 rebounds. Millsap averaged a high of 17.4 points a game in the 2010-11 season.
Signing with the Hawks gave Millsap an opportunity to remain in a starting lineup and have an expanded role.
With the Hawks, Millsap is averaging 16.5 points and 8.1 rebounds, both stats second only to Al Horford.
There is a recent precedent for a former player trying to do too much against a former team in Atlanta. Josh Smith, who spent nine seasons with the Hawks before leaving via free agency, had 11 points and six rebounds in his return Nov. 20. Smith shot 5 of 15 from the field, including 0 of 4 from 3-point range. Two days later, in Auburn Hills, Smith had zero points and seven rebounds as he missed all seven shots.
“I try to stay away from having a chip on my shoulder,” Millsap said of his release from the Jazz. “I’m going to try not to get overly emotional about the game and go out there and do something that is not in my character, is not in our team’s character. That’s what I’m trying to avoid, not doing too much and just (have) the game come to me.”
Hawks coach Mike Budenholzer, who last month returned to San Antonio where he was an assistant for 19 years, echoed the sentiments of Carroll. The coach advised Millsap to play defense and rebound and the offense will come.
Millsap and Carroll will provide the Hawks with a great deal of inside information having played in the Jazz system under coach Tyrone Corbin. Millsap said he remains familiar with the Jazz and keeps in contact with several of his former teammates. He does expect a few wrinkles from Corbin as the coach tries to get a struggling team, at 7-21, headed in the right direction.
For his part, Millsap is just fine with his current address.
“I couldn’t be happier here,” Millsap said. “Hopefully that team does well because they deserve it, their fans deserve it. But I’m happy right here.”
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