FAYETTEVILLE — Ronnie Brewer leaves for Salt Lake City today, ready to get back to the NBA grind and make the kind of quantum leap in his third season that he did in going from a rookie who played sparingly to a secondyear starter at shooting guard for the Utah Jazz.

Training camp doesn’t begin until Sept. 30, but Brewer is anxious to begin working out with his teammates this week.

“I feel like I’ve done well with the opportunities I’ve had, but I’m not satisfied,” Brewer, a former Fayetteville High School and Arkansas star, said earlier this week. “I always want to strive to get better.

“ I can’t be satisfied or relax, because in the NBA, everybody’s out there working to get better.”

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Brewer, 6-7 and 223 pounds, spent much of the summer in Fayetteville, but also traveled to Little Rock, Kansas City and California.

Wherever he went, he continued working on his basketball skills and his strength and conditioning.

“You might take a little break after the season,” he said. “But as a professional basketball player, it’s pretty much a year-around job.”

Brewer goes into his third NBA season as an established starter for the Jazz, who reached the Western Conference semifinals last season before losing to the Los Angeles Lakers in a six-game series.

As a second-year player, Brewer started all 76 games in which he played and averaged 27. 3 minutes, 12. 0 points, 2. 9 rebounds, 1. 8 assists and 1. 7 steals.

Brewer played in 56 games as a rookie and averaged 12. 1 minutes, 4. 5 points and 1. 3 rebounds.

“I knew I didn’t want to stay the same,” Brewer said of the improvement he made in his second NBA season. “I wanted to show the organization and the fans it was the right choice to draft me.”

Utah’s stars are point guard Deron Williams and power forward Carlos Boozer, who both played on the United States’ gold medalwinning team at the Olympics, but Brewer has become a key player.

“I thought he had a great year — he played well,” Jazz veteran forward Matt Harping told the Salt Lake City Tribune after the season. “I think he’s got a big future. He’s a good kid, and I enjoyed playing with him.... He took several steps forward this year.”

Brewer went through an intensive rookie indoctrination from Jerry Sloan, who is going into his 20 th season as Utah’s coach and was a standout player for the Chicago Bulls.

“Coach Sloan is really tough on young guys,” Brewer said. “But you’ve got to buy into it and listen, because he’s experienced everything he’s telling you about.

“ He told me patience is a virtue, just keep working and keep working, get better, and your time will come.”

Brewer, the 14 th overall pick in the first round of the 2006 NBA Draft, laughed when asked about the difference between rookie expectations and the reality of his first season with Utah.

“On draft night, you’re so excited,” Brewer said. “You’re like, ‘Oh man, I’m in the NBA !’ It’s your dream come true.

“ Then you get to training camp and it’s completely different. You come back down to earth. Everything is hard-nosed and fastpaced, and they don’t really have time to wait on you.”

Brewer said at times it felt as if he were back in elementary school.

“It’s like you’re starting all over again, and that’s tough after you’ve been the man from junior high all the way through college,” he said. “Not only are you not starting, there are some games when you might not even play.”

As a rookie, Brewer got good counsel from his father, former NBA player and Arkansas All-American Ron Brewer, as well as Jazz teammates such as Williams and Derek Fisher (Little Rock Parkview, UALR ).

“That hurt Ronnie to sit on the bench, because he’d never had to do that,” Ron Brewer said. “But we stayed in his ear constantly to let him know it wasn’t about his basketball, it was part of the business.

“ Now I think he’s come to understand what professional basketball is all about, and how to handle things like a pro.”

Utah’s starting shooting guard spot opened up last season after Fisher got his release and re-signed with the Lakers so his daughter could live closer to recommended treatment centers for a rare form of eye cancer.

“When we lost Fisher, we were concerned,” Sloan told the Tribune. “We had inexperienced guys.

“ But Ronnie came in and clearly won the job. There wasn’t anybody on our staff who said he didn’t.”

As Utah’s starter at shooting guard, Brewer regularly went headto-head with some of the NBA’s top players, including MVP Kobe Bryant of the Lakers, Houston’s Tracy McGrady, Atlanta’s Joe Johnson (Little Rock Central, Razorbacks ); and Denver’s Allen Iverson.

“Those guys are all-stars, superstars,” Brewer said. “It just makes me want to work harder, because I want to be where they are.

“ They’re going to push me to get better, and I look forward to the challenge. I don’t try and back down from those kind of things, because they’re not going to back down from me.”

Sloan told the Deseret Morning News of Salt Lake City during the playoffs last season he could see the progress in Brewer’s game.

“We really admire what he’s done thus far,” Sloan said. “But we expect more. And he has to expect more out of himself. He can’t just say, ‘Well, I’m in the NBA.’... He’s got a tremendous amount of growing to do.”

As Brewer’s NBA playing experience increased, so did his comfort level.

“I think basketball is a game of confidence,” he said. “If you have confidence in yourself, it’s going to allow the coaches and your teammates to have confidence in you, too.

“ Once I got the confidence I could play at the level with those type of players, it became easier.

“ Every game I learned a little bit more. Getting thrown in a starting role, you get that experience to take your game to another level.”

Carolyn Brewer, Ronnie’s mother, said she expected him to become a starter last year.

“He had a mission, and a plan, and that’s what our family is all about,” she said. “He didn’t like sitting on the bench. He was going o win a starting spot.”

Brewer, who Wednesday donated $ 50, 000 to Arkansas ’ African-American studies program to support scholarships, is scheduled to make $ 1, 834, 680 this season after making $ 1, 595, 400 as a rookie and $ 1, 715, 040 last season.

“I’ve been blessed financially,” Brewer said at a news conference announcing his donation. “Hopefully, this is the first of many.”

The Jazz has an option for a fourth season that would pay Brewer $ 2, 717, 161, or he could become a free agent after this season.

Ideally for Brewer, Utah will offer him a long-term contract extension. He said he’d like to have a lengthy run with the Jazz.

“I like the situation I’m in,” Brewer said. “A lot of people don’t know that much about Salt Lake City, but we have the best fans in the NBA.

“ We’re the only professional team in Utah, so it’s similar to Arkansas, where we get the whole state’s support.”