SALT LAKE CITY -- In the days before a cake for her husband's 49th birthday and a flight to Honolulu for the opening of training camp, Gina Zanik made her stand. Her husband, Justin, the general manager of the Utah Jazz, had gone eight years without a physical exam and she vowed that he wouldn't go eight more hours without making an appointment with the team doctor.
She told him he looked tired, thinner. The long gap in physicals felt like an anvil hanging over them. Justin countered with what he always did: There were the late-summer scouting trips to Japan, the Philippines and Australia; the trades; the games; the endless NBA front office calendar.