Basketball: It's all hanging in the air

By PETER JESSUP

Sean Marks is in limbo.

Not for the first time in his basketball career, probably not for the last.

His team, the Miami Heat, had a poor NBA season, missed the playoffs and is conducting a major review. He is off-contract, as are several others, but the Heat management is not talking to anyone just yet.

That could mean they are going to punt coach Pat Riley and want to keep their options open for a new guy. It certainly means there will be a major shift in the roster. Maybe Marks will fit the new plan - maybe not.

"They've told everybody they won't be talking until July, signing in August. Obviously me not being a first-name player it could be later [for me]. I've been in this situation before. If you want to keep doing what you love, well ... " and he shrugs. It goes with the territory.

"I still want to - and believe I can - play in the NBA or in Europe."

Marks, the only New Zealander to make the NBA, is mentor now to the man who might be next, Kirk Penney. The pair have followed a similar path to this point.

Both came from the North Shore, Marks from Rangitoto College and Penney from Westlake Boys, and both were recommended to American college scouts by then-coaches of the North Harbour squad. Neither played much for Harbour, shifting to the US in their late teens.

Marks went on to be captain of the Berkley Golden Bears, as Penney was of the Wisconsin Badgers. After completing his degree in political science, Marks went into round four of the NBA draft in June 1998 and was picked up by the New York Knicks.

They traded him to Toronto for the more experienced forward Marcus Camby. Toronto gave him a frustrating amount of time on the bench and after injury he made his way back with Kinder Bologne in the Italian league.

Toronto put Marks in another complicated trade with the Boston Celtics but he never got there, others failing the required medicals. He stayed, playing 34 games for the Raptors before going to the Miami Heat in the 2000/01 season, and has now played 23 games for them.

Through that time he has been bothered by shin splints, turned ankles, a back problem, a gashed finger, the cornea scratch that kept him out of the final games at last year's world championships, foot surgery mid-NBA season and now a serious elbow tear.

"It's frustrating," he said of all that, "but it's a part of the game if you want to play at a high level."

Two months ago, Marks was trying to protect his hoop when he tangled arms with another player who then spun away, cracking his elbow and dislodging a range of ligaments.

He was told he would be out six to eight months, a year if surgery was required.

Marks is home to take advantage of a programme from Murray Hing, who has helped him with physiotherapy since he was a teenager. He declares himself three months ahead of the early prognosis.

He is in Auckland for a month and has up to five hours' treatment every day.

Given the injury and the time it will take him to regain match-fitness, plus the prospect of having to attend repeated team trials and camps if he has to seek another home, he has ruled himself out of taking any part in the Tall Blacks' campaign this year.

But the Athens Olympics remain the main focus. "No experience is as big as walking out at the Olympic opening. It's a dream I thought I'd never achieve."





The close-knit group the team became while touring Europe ahead of the world champs had played a part in their success in Indianapolis.

"Trust me, I rubbed it in," he said of New Zealand's fourth place while the US finished sixth.

The confidence the young side had from that experience would drive them on, so would the added competition a New Zealand team in Australia would put on incumbents as more players came through.



Marks does not rule out playing for the Proteam Breakers at some stage in the future, he and wife Jennifer having already discussed raising their kids here.

But at 27 he has a lot of years left at top level - barring injury.

The priority right now is "showing people I'm not injury-prone".

Inside Track

Name: Sean Marks

Born: August 23, 1975

Height: 2.08m

Weight: 113kg

Educated: Rangitoto College

Played for: North Harbour junior, University of California, Berkley 1995-1997, Toronto Raptors/Kinder Bologna (Italy) 1998-2000

NBA debut: March 16, 1999 in a 100-85 win over the New Jersey Nets

Games: 34 games for Toronto. 23 for Miami Heat 2000-2003.

NBA average: 2.3 points, 1.5 rebounds.

International: Tall Black since 1997