Dirk Nowitzki Lost Some Motivation After Winning Championship

Dirk Nowitzki came into the season out of shape, as he had spent the lockout partying and doing everything but playing basketball. Dirk admits that after finally winning his first NBA title, he had lost some of the motivation and fire needed to play at a high level. From SI: “When you devote your career to winning the final game, what do you do after it’s been won? At long last Dirk Nowitzki didn’t know what he was in for. ‘I didn’t know what to expect,’ he said. ‘I know one thing changed, and that was my motivation was gone for a little bit,’ Nowitzki went on. ‘And I really had to fight to get it back and get the fun back.’ […] Within weeks of winning the NBA title, he was back in the gym, training for the European Championship in hopes of qualifying for another Olympics. It was too much. He was overwhelmed. ‘Now I reached both goals, and it was just hard in the beginning,’ he said. ‘The Euros came too quick, right after the [NBA] championship. I only had, like, a month off. I needed more time to get away and enjoy the championship. If I would have had a couple months off to enjoy it, party, get everything out of the way, then start slowly back up — that would have been the way to go. But I decided to play, to try my best, and we didn’t qualify, unfortunately.’ […] What is he supposed to do next? He looks at the ring and remembers, yes, of course, I’m supposed to win another one of those. ‘Just do it again,’ he said. ‘I would love to do it again, but it’s going to be hard.'”