It's the only Olympic basketball event the U.S. hasn't won. Can Jimmer Fredette fix that?
'JimmerMania' still exists inside the United States' men's 3×3 basketball program, it just took an elevator ride from the court up to the C suite.
The hope is still that Jimmer Fredette will bring Olympic gold to the only USA Basketball team that doesn't have one; only he'd do it by making a phone call instead of swishing a winning shot.
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On Monday, USA Basketball named Fredette, 36, the 2011 college national player of the year and a former NBA lottery pick, as its first managing director for its 3×3 men's team. The announcement follows Fredette's announced retirement from his playing career last week, the final two years of which he spent knocking around the FIBA 3×3 World Tour and playing for the USA in international events such as the 2023 World Cup and 2024 Paris Olympics.
Think of it as the 'Grant Hill' role for 3×3 — an accomplished, universally respected player in the sport whose job it is to find coaches and players for the big international tournaments like the Olympics and World Cup.
Because the international 3×3 game is not open to NBA players (more on that later), there really isn't a player the USA might target who wouldn't take Fredette's call.
And he'll be calling. The 3×3 version of Dr. Naismith's game has been in two Olympics now, and the American men have exactly zero medals to show. Last summer in Paris, the men's 3×3 team was the only U.S. basketball team not to win a medal.
An injury to Fredette early in the Paris Olympics dealt the U.S. a serious blow, but it would seem the American program should be farther along than it is. And with the next Summer Olympics set for Los Angeles in 2028, there is little time to waste.
'I think that one of the big things for USA basketball is they want to be consistent with how they go about their teams,' Fredette said in an interview. 'You know, the 5-on-5 (men's) team has been doing this for a while with Grant Hill, and he's done an incredible job. And they see the success that that's kind of implemented. And I think that with (3×3), it's such a new sport, that they didn't really have anybody that was necessarily fit for that job, because most of the guys that had been playing from the beginning of (3×3) for USA were still playing. … There's no better person to be involved (than) someone who's actually been in it, been through it, just like Grant has on the men's side.'
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The U.S. women's 3×3 team, which won the first Olympic gold in the sport in Tokyo in 2021 and won bronze in Paris, is also looking to make a hire for the managing director's role. The women's 5-on-5 program has won eight consecutive Olympic gold medals, and the men have won five straight.
Fredette, who lives with his wife and children in Denver, is a partner at Tandem Ventures, a venture capital firm in Utah, and will remain in that role in addition to overseeing the U.S. 3×3 men's program.
The rules set forth by FIBA — the international governing body for basketball — for men's players to be eligible for the biggest tournaments (again, like the Olympics and World Cup) are that players must compile enough points by competing on the 3×3 World Tour, which lasts over the late spring, summer, and early fall months. That's why active NBA players are not an option for the U.S. or any other country; NBA players are not allowed to play in other leagues, and the World Tour counts as one.
Fredette burst onto the basketball scene with his jaw-dropping shooting and scoring performances at BYU, where he won the award for the top player in Division-I college basketball in 2011. Drafted 10th overall that June by the Sacramento Kings, the best of Fredette's six NBA seasons was his first one, when he averaged 7.6 points in 60 games. His last full NBA season was in 2014-15, when he played 50 games for the New Orleans Pelicans.
Fredette matriculated overseas, to China, where he was handsomely paid and starred. In 2016-17, his first season in the Chinese pro league, he scored 50 or more points four different times and dropped 73 points against Zhejiang Guangsha that season, and in his last year with Shanghai, in 2020-21, at age 31, he drained 11 3s and rung up another 70-bill against Sichuan.
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Fredette joined the World Tour late in 2022, at the urging of Fran Frischilla, the former college coach and current ESPN broadcaster who was an adviser to USA Basketball for 3×3.
Jimmer said he made more than $100,000 in each of the two full summers he spent on tour, eventually played his way to a No. 1 world ranking as an individual, was on the U.S. team that finished second in the 2023 World Cup, and won gold medals at smaller international tournaments featuring teams from the Americas.
'He's perfect (for managing director),' said Frischilla, whose son, James, was an assistant coach for the U.S. at the Paris Olympics. 'Jimmer brought notoriety to the sport here in the States that we couldn't have paid for. I think guys are going to want to play 3×3 because they saw Jimmer do it.'
In the 3×3 game, the shot clock is only 12 seconds. After a made basket, the opposite team throws the ball in bounds from underneath the hoop, and it has to be taken back to the 2-point line (it's a 2-point, 1-point game). After a miss, if the defending team rebounds the ball, it has to go out to the 2-point line. Offensive actions are often limited to one screen-and-roll, maybe one backdoor cut or off-ball screen if the ballhandler is working in isolation. Precision passing and conditioning are key.
Also, the U.S. men's program has had some really bad luck.
Because of the global pandemic in 2020 that postponed the Olympics and shut down the World Tour, the American men had to qualify for the Tokyo Games through a single qualifying tournament. After weeks of preparation, one of the players — Hall-of-Famer Rick Barry's son, Canyon — suffered a back injury just before the tournament. The last-minute replacement for Barry didn't fit with the other three players, and the Americans failed to qualify for Tokyo.
With Fredette on board for the 2024 Olympic cycle, the U.S. was ranked No. 1 in the world heading into the Paris Games. The Americans opened the 2024 Olympics with a loss to Serbia, and early in the second game, Fredette suffered a torn adductor, knocking him out of the tournament. The Americans were not allowed to replace him, so Barry and the remaining two U.S. players Dylan Travis and Kareem Maddox — who was also battling injury — had to play the remaining games without a substitution. The U.S. finished 2-5.
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'It's just one of those things where you can look back on it in hindsight, people that don't know the sport and haven't really followed it, and say, 'Oh man, that didn't work. We didn't even come close to medaling,' Fredette said. 'But we were the No. 1 team in the world going into that event and really kind of hitting on all cylinders. And then one unfortunate thing like that happens, and it can mess it all up.'
Fredette said his main objective, or a change he would try to implement, is to make 3×3 more of a full-time job for players who are fully committed to the sport. In addition to Fredette, who was still working as a venture capitalist while playing 3×3, his teammates in Paris all have regular jobs.
Barry is a rocket scientist. Maddox is a video coordinator with the Minnesota Timberwolves. Travis, currently the highest-ranked 3×3 player from the U.S. (16th in the world), is a school teacher in Omaha.
One way to create a wider pool of players who are both good enough and available is to encourage and target G League players not under contract with an NBA team to give the 3×3 game a try.
'As the sport grows, I think there is a space for more full-time 3×3 athletes,' Barry said. 'I know Jimmer will do an amazing job leading the charge. … The game and sport is so volatile with such a condensed game that anyone can win the Olympics, and that's part of why it's so exciting.'
Yes, there are going to be more variables out of the Americans' control than in, say, a 40-minute, full-court, 5-on-5 Olympics game. One injury, especially to a player like Fredette, can be devastating. The games are so short, a hot shooting stretch by an opponent for even a few minutes can be enough to sink the U.S.
But with the Games coming to L.A., and the 3×3 Olympic tournament expanding from eight to 12 teams, the U.S. wants to make sure it is as organized, prepared, and deep as possible for a country so otherwise rich in basketball talent and tradition.
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'We want to make sure that we're out in front of it and finding the right guys, building an actual culture, building a program, getting them as professionals, and just continuing to get better and better at this game,' Fredette said. 'And I think if we can build that way, we're going to be in good shape.'
(Top photo of Jimmer Fredette: Dustin Satloff / Getty Images for the USOPC)
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