2019 FIBA World Cup in China thread

As long as MDA doesnt lose to France, all good.

 

Not only international basketball is real basketball.

 

lol if melo was playing they would still have lost and melo would have been the main culprit then

jvg on the other hand i think would have made the difference

 

I don't think you realize how much fans still think the rest of the world sucks at basketball. One of most recent examples was last year's draft (Doncic), where some people wholeheartedly believed NCAA is better or at least equal to Euroleague.

 

Sadly, that pride is vanishing more and more in favour of long-term contracts in NBA. The best international players, save for exemptions, only join their NT when their value is low. With new contract in hand or free agency on horizon, they stay home and prepare for new season.

As for USA players not representing their country, that's weird. Country of USA spends a lot of time and effort to instill nationalistic feelings in their citizens. But as you said, it's really hard to represent a country whose administration is everyday's laughing stock all over the world.

 

I'm sure Pop already did.

 

lol, serbia leading 26-5 with 2 mins left in the 1st quarter. these players on team usa have no pride.

 

Can I get a link??

 

USA proves again midgets basketball does not work.

 

USA got spanked partly due to a coach unwilling to use the 3 ball even though he went small and barely brought any real big men with him.

 

Well, of the best 15 NBA players as defined by the 2019 All-NBA team selections, 14 of them are eligible to play in this world cup (Cameroon did not qualify). 3 out of 14 are international players, and all of them are playing for their countries. 11 out of 11 USA players are not playing. Enough said.

Not saying it's right or wrong, but just stating a fact: The international players care a lot more about representing their country even though they are personally in the same capitalism and business calculus of the NBA.

People blamed or praised how much Yao played for China, but for every iconic foreign player, it's like that: check how much the Gasols played for Spain, Nowitzki for Germany, Ginobili for Argentina, etc.

 

My guess, Harden, Curry, Zion, AD, Dame, Kawhi, I really expect everyone to show up for this that can basically. Lebron is probably too old for it by this point. I think some of the guys that played this year will get picked on loyalty. I could see Taytum, Kemba, Donovan still being with the team but having smaller roles.

 

I'm not sure about this narrative. The current trend could snowball. Good players (not really "stars," guys like Middleton) could basically say "well screw this. I put in all this time, effort and risk, and am getting lambasted for losing in international ball. Why bother?" It could be that, next time, the Hardens and Currys skip it, and then the Kembas and Middletons skip it too. I mean... it could get worse.

 

No pride.

We better not lose to Poland

 

I don't see it. The USA players always takes the Olympics seriously when it comes to playing for the team, since they've been allowed to have NBA players go to the Olympics they have never fielded a weak team.

A team without chemistry or a team that didn't take it and the competition seriously, sure, but never a weak team. It just has never happened. The last time USA took losses to international teams was much worse because those teams were actually better and guys still signed up for the redeem team, which wasn't even a redemption in talent just that the team was more committed and they focused on building a team

Here's a history of the teams sent to the Olympics
https://www.basketball-reference.com/awards/uso.html

This is a legacy thing for a lot of players, it's a trophy that goes in your trophy case, it could get worse, but I doubt it.

Also, the FIBA tourney is a lot different. I mentioned at the start of this thread that the schedule is going up against the NBA schedule, it almost feels like by design it is but that's another topic of FIBA vs NBA.

This will be the trend for FIBA going forward because of the window, these guys are still playing games, have to play one more game against Poland on Friday, have to travel back to USA and get ready for preseason, when FIBA is stateside maybe we get more superstar players, but in China? Nah. Olympics end August 9th, Fiba 32 teams Olympics 16, these guys are playing a week and a half of basketball months before preseason starts, a huge difference in who comes, these guys play basketball in the offseason any ways. In fact there is a positive trend of guys that play for Team USA Olympic teams come into the NBA having great seasons.

 

Rockets: hold my beer. We will start Ego at the sf.

 

Ha! Yeah, that should work well. Not even Tucker will be on the team then, nevermind players of Harden's caliber.

 

So . . Who was this Coach?
Rudy T took College players to a Bronze. . . .

Rocket River