John Starks wasn't with a winner at Golden State. He wasn't really wanted in Chicago.
In Utah, however, Starks has two things he did not the past couple of seasons — two things that mean enough to him that it was an easy call to sign as a free agent with the Jazz, which is what the longtime New York Knicks shooting guard did Wednesday.
In Utah, as Starks sees it, he was the potential to win again, and a sense that he really is wanted.
"Both are big draws," Starks' agent, Leigh Steinberg, said of the role that 'wins and want' played in his client's decision to join the Jazz. "Having the experience he had last year with Chicago and Golden State — that was something he had not been used to with the New York Knicks."
Winning was something Starks was not used to at all with Golden State or Chicago, which is what has him most excited about coming to Utah.
"I've been through it all," Starks, a self-admitted "sore loser" said Thursday morning. "I had a chance to win a championship back in 1994. After that, I've been up and down throughout the last four or five years, and really haven't had a chance to get back to the NBA (Finals).
"I believe Utah gives me that chance right now to do that."
Starks, who turns 35 years old later this month, turned down overtures of interest from Miami, Orlando, the Knicks and Minnesota to sign for the Jazz's mid-level salary-cap exception slot. In addition to the $2.25 million he will earn this season, Starks holds the option for a second year at $2.47 million — making the package potentially worth $4.72 million.
"When I sat down and we had lunch, they just came and flat-out told me, 'I'm their guy,'" said Starks, who met with Jazz owner Larry H. Miller, vice president of basketball operations Kevin O'Connor, head coach Jerry Sloan and two-time NBA MVP Karl Malone of the Jazz during a visit to Salt Lake last week. "No other team, really, could tell me that."
Starks admitted the Jazz were not initially his first choice but said they soon became just that.
"The teams that I was interested in going to," he said, "were saying they were interested in bringing me in, but 'this is what would have to happen,' or 'this would have had to happen.' That kind of didn't sit well with me at that particular time, and (the Jazz) just came in and told me I have a good shot to come in here and start.
"But that wasn't the deciding factor for me — starting. It's just that they said that 'I'm their guy,' and this made it a lot clearer as to what I wanted to do."
The Jazz had hoped to announce that the contract had been finalized Tuesday, the first day this summer that NBA teams could sign free agents.
Instead, attorneys took until Wednesday afternoon to make the option year of the deal conform to terms of the Collective Bargaining Agreement between the NBA and the NBA Players Association — and for language of the pact to be approved by the league.
That done, Starks turned his attention to what he has gotten himself into: the chance to do what Jeff Malone and retiring Jeff Hornacek could not; the chance to be the starting shooting guard who helps Karl Malone and John Stockton win the NBA title that has eluded them so far (and the title that has eluded him despite getting to the Finals with the Knicks in '94).
"I have great feelings, more so than bad feelings (regarding the Finals)," said Starks, whose Knicks lost to Houston that year. "The only unfortunate thing is that we didn't win it all, and that I didn't have a good seventh game like I did in Game 6.
"It's bittersweet, in a sense, but that's what keeps the fire burning, because you take the one time, and you want to get back to that point, to prove yourself over. That's always what keeps me getting up every year — is coming back, and hoping you get back to that point."
If Starks sounds anxious about rejoining a winning organization, it's only because he is. He struggled to cope with Golden State's ineptitude, and was even more frustrated when he was traded last season to Chicago — a move designed only to clear salary-cap space for the now hapless Bulls.
"He's really excited," Steinberg said of Starks, who left the Bulls in March and finished the season sitting at home in Tulsa, Okla., rather than playing for yet another losing organization. "I mean, (Utah) is a quality organization — one of the best in basketball. To have the chance to play with John Stockton and Karl Malone and that cast of characters — that's exciting."
E-MAIL: tbuckley@desnews.com