The Nets may have a team full of big names familiar to NBA fans, but perhaps the most intriguing player on the roster is one few people here ever have seen play.
That would be Bojan Bogdanovic, the 6-foot-8 swingman who the Nets took with the first pick of the second round in 2011 — only for him to spend the next three years playing for Fenerbahce Ulker, one of Europe’s top teams, in the Turkish League. But when the 25-year-old’s contract with the Istanbul club expired this summer, the Nets gave him a three-year deal for roughly $10 million to finally bring him to Brooklyn.
Now the acclimation process has begun, starting with the first few days of training camp and an immediate taste of what NBA life is like.
“It’s a little bit tough for me [so far], because I’m not used to practicing like this, with this kind of energy and toughness,” Bogdanovic said. “Everything is new for me the first couple of days, but over the next few days I’ll pick it up.”
The Nets are counting on Bogdanovic to do just that. The starting spot vacated by free agent Paul Pierce’s departure to Washington is up for grabs, and it is one either Bogdanovic, Alan Anderson or Andrei Kirilenko is expected to fill.
But whether Bogdanovic immediately becomes a starter, his legitimate NBA 3-point range and ability to score in bunches — something he proved by averaging over 20 points per game for Croatia in the FIBA World Cup last month — have the Nets expecting him to be a big part of their plans.
In order to do so, however, Bogdanovic will have to make the transition to the NBA, something that isn’t easy for foreign players — from the 3-point line being over a foot farther from the basket to the ball being different.
“It’s different on my fingers,” Bogdanovic said. “It [feels] completely different.”
Bogdanovic does have a built-in advantage in his transition. The Nets roster already includes three European players — Kirilenko, Sergey Karasev and Mirza Teletovic — whom Bogdanovic can lean on for advice.
Perhaps no one will be more instrumental to that process than Teletovic, who has two years of NBA experience. Both he and Bogdanovic hail from Mostar in Bosnia and Herzegovina and speak Croatian.
“One of the best things for me is to have someone like Mirza here, especially because this is his third year,” Bogdanovic said. “He can help me a lot, especially because I don’t speak a lot of English, so he’s a really big help for me these first couple of days.”
Teletovic — another long-distance shooter — has done his best to try and help Bogdanovic, spending time doing shooting drills after practice every day to help him get acclimated to the different ball and shooting distance from 3-point range, something Teletovic said it took an entire year for him to get used to.
“It’s the reason I stay after with him every practice and we shoot,” Teletovic said. “I think it’s important for him to be consistent, come in every day and try to get shots up as much as he can, just to get used to it.”
Though it will be important for Bogdanovic to get used to the differences at the offensive end of the court, he said the biggest adjustment is getting used to the defensive principles in the NBA, and to what coach Lionel Hollins wants him to do.
“Defense [here] is much different,” he said. “That’s going to be the biggest adjustment I have to do. But day by day I am getting better and better, and the veterans are trying to help me and I am getting very appreciative of that.”
Another thing in Bogdanovic’s favor is a different role. He was the star and focal point of both Fenerbahce and the Croatian national team. With the Nets he will be counted on initially to stretch the floor and fit in amidst the more established stars.
“I won’t have the same number of shots I had in Europe,” Bogdanovic said. “It’s a completely different role for me, and [one] I think that I can play.”
The Nets are banking on him being right.