The importance of being Samad Nikkhah Bahrami!

KUALA LUMPUR (Mageshwaran’s AsiaScope) - There comes a stage in every basketball player’s career, when his contribution to the team begins to transcend the PPG-RPG-APG routine.

These are the moments when a player has to go beyond the numerical statistics and add an intrinsic value to his presence on the court – and more importantly on the bench. These are what I loosely term as “leadership moments.”

Samad Nikkhah Bahrami is going through such a phase in his career with the Iranian National Team.

Gone are the days when you expected a 20-point game from Samad. The focus now is on how many youngsters he can facilitate to such a scoring performance.

Gone are the days when you expected a double-double from Samad. These are days when Iran, and to an extent FIBA Asia, basketball is looking to him to provide the spark to his teammates, most of them, young.

At the most, his regular performance of statistical numbers, stupendous as they are, now has become only signs of “leading by example.”

If the indications seen at the 4th FIBA Asia Cup in Tokyo, Japan last week are anything to go by, Samad has indeed embraced this role of a leader rather well.

The 29-year-old emerged as the undoubted Most Valuable Player of the competition, but to me his MVP moment was when he stepped up out of his position in the zone defense to tap the ball off Takatoshi Furukawa, moments after Iran had taken what went on to become the decisive lead, nipping the latter’s ambition of an attempt and then followed it up with a defensive rebound to seal Iran’s title-triumph.

Samad’s performance of 14 points, 7 steals, 4 rebounds and 2 assists in the game, thus became a mere bonus.

Iran’s coach Memi Becirovic, himself out to prove his position, said as much.

“He (Samad) is my right hand man,” said Becirovic, on his maiden appearance as the coach of the Iran team in a FIBA Asia competition, in one of the post game press conferences.

“He is sort of an assistant coach in handling the youngsters in the team,” went on the Slovenian coach, who took his home country’s National Team to the Quarter-Finals of the 2010 FIBA World Championship in Turkey.

The other trait of Samad’s that is beginning to unravel itself is the modesty and humility with which he is handling the role. He was always one of the more pleasant and nicer guys to talk to, and the increased load on his shoulders has made him humble and modest.

“It’s embarrassing sometimes when these guys look up to you,” Samad said during a tete-a-tete in Tokyo.

“But then that’s when you realize that your position in the team is not normal. I do feel special, but I feel more privileged to be guiding these youngsters,” the Mahram forward said.

“He says the nastiest thing in the nicest way. The youngsters just adore him,” marveled point guard Aren Davoudi.

“This award belongs to my team,” Samad said of his MVP award in Tokyo.

“Let’s look at it logically. I know I got this award because we won the gold. And we won the gold mainly because the youngsters rose to the occasion. Personally what matters to me now is that we put these youngsters on the right track,” he added.

Samad was a pivotal member of Iran’s golden generation of basketball players, the most glittering in fact. And now, he’s just making sure the glitter doesn’t stop with him alone.

Next week, we talk about some upcoming talent in the women’s section in FIBA Asia teams.

So long…

S Mageshwaran

FIBA Asia

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