Jaric’s Season Likely Over

Marko Jaric probably has played his last game for the Clippers this season because of a stress fracture in his left foot, the Serb point guard said Friday, adding that he might also sit out the Olympics this summer to avoid further injury.

Jaric has not played since March 7, when he complained of soreness in his foot during the closing minutes of a 91-71 victory over the Portland Trail Blazers.

Tests this week showed the fracture.

Jaric, 25, suffered a similar injury in his right foot last summer and has been bothered by other foot ailments that he believes are the result of playing competitive basketball year-round since he was 18, professionally in the winter and internationally in the summer.

That’s why he might forgo the Olympics, though he knows such a move would be met unfavorably back home in Serbia and Montenegro.

Jaric, along with Vlade Divac and Peja Stojakovic of the Sacramento Kings, helped Yugoslavia win the world championship two years ago at Indianapolis, where a U.S. team featuring Jermaine O’Neal and Baron Davis finished sixth.

“It’s a very tough decision,” Jaric acknowledged, “because you know how the Olympics are big and everybody wants to be part of the event, especially playing for my national team; it’s a great honor.

“But also I need to think about my career. This is like the fourth year in a row [where] basically the first two months of the season, I’m playing terrible because I’m missing my energy, I’ve got injuries.

“I start thinking about my career, and maybe ... for the first time in my life I come ready to get off to a good start from the first day of training camp and be ready to compete with the best point guards in the league.”

In his second season with the Clippers -- he played six seasons in Italy and Greece -- Jaric has averaged 8.5 points on 38.8% shooting, 34% from beyond the three-point arc. He leads the team in assists and steals.

If he bowed out of the Olympics, he said, he would spend the summer in Los Angeles, preparing for next season.

In the last year of his contract, the 30th pick in the 2000 draft is due to make $2.1 million next season.

“As I’m going to give 110% for the Clippers, the same thing I’m going to do for my national team,” he said. “But so far I’ve risked very much for our national team, and I think I owe it to myself to start the season [injury-free] and to have a great season because this is my crucial year next year, probably.

“I’m going to see if I’m going to be a high-level player or I’m going to be a low-level player -- where I am, basically.”

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UP NEXT

Sunday vs. Golden State at Staples Center, 12:30 p.m. -- On his 50th birthday, Mike Dunleavy coaches against his son for the third time. “We’ll see what kind of a birthday present he gives me,” Dunleavy said of Mike Jr., who is 0-2 against his father after losses in November at Oakland and in January at Staples Center.