Lol yea ignore the posts that made a mockery out of your logic. 30 GMs LMAO... keep telling yourself that you are opening a can of whoopass Mr. Iraqi Information Minister. Again, that wasn't an issue when we were winning with the Dream team was it? Regardless, if you think those rules will neutralize the dream team's talent, you pass me whatever the f you are smoking. Neutralize post play? hmm if you haven't notice Gasol and Yao are dominant FIBA players and oh yea, shorter three pointers.. wow the horror.
awwh little rookie is mad! you can't get off us the bus until us bus drivers tell you to. I mean, we're taking you to school.
Man, this Rockza dude is like Greg Maddux still attempting to pitch with his logic. His repetitive, baseless and childish arguments are exactly like Maddux's 70 MPH "fastball" coming in with posters here licking their chops waiting for a reply. Give it up already. The arrogant "We're soooo much better" and "this shouldn't even even been close" stance doesn't fly with any objective basketball fan. If you're familiar with FIBA and the way those games are played any team could be beaten at any given moment. Team USA's talent advantage is arguably neutralized by their unfamiliarity with FIBA rules and their lack of chemistry -- two months together vs. playing together year round. Just because the gold medal game wasn't a blowout does nothing to diminish their accomplishment. They won and they won against a team that no, wasn't quite as talented from top-to-bottom but a team with a talented enough NBA/non-NBA rotation to hang tough and make things interesting. Calling them "scrubs" doesn't make you informed.
Pirates fans are morally obligated to hate anybody associated with the Braves or Cubs. I get your point though.
Most of the argument against me has been the average 30+ point blowout wins anyway. Maybe you should be talking to them. My point is with our team and the Spanish team with a 17 yr old PG should not have been this close. The US team disappointed if you ask anybody. It's like Duke barely winning against a great high school team. Yes my dear friends, the talent difference between the two teams were that much. For f sakes, we are talking about Kobe, Lebron, CP3, Dwayne Wade etc etc.! wtf... Anyteam can be beaten anytime? Sigh if that is making your case, ok! Fiba rules?? really? 2 months together.. wtf? this team has been together for 3 years. Please don't tell me you think the Spanish team plays year around with each other. In case you haven't noticed, Gasol plays in the NBA too. Wait, and calling them talented doesn't make you informed either. Talented by International level?? Sure. Talented compare to the US team? Not even friggin close. Again, if you are happy we just won against Spain, fine. Whatever makes you happy.
It's astonishing that you can essentially write off Team USA's accomplishment simply because they didn't have a blowout win in ONE game. I suppose a tournament win is only legitimate if you completely embarrass your opponent in each game. Right? But no, I get it. Your response is going to be something along the lines of "You're blind if WADE, CP3, LEBRON, HOWARD, ETC are all on the team AND YOU DON'T BLOWOUT EVERYBODY!!! That team should be untouchable...blah blah blah" Where were you before the gold medal game? What was your stance then? I'm not even trying to be antagonistic either. I'm just curious how somebody can form that conclusion given the complete dominance Team USA had demonstrated the entire tournament up to that point.
As a matter of fact it was an issue prior and has remained one - David Robinson had to play on a losing Olympic team, avergaing all of 12 ppg - before he played on a winning one, on a team that only had one good outside shooter (Hersey Hawkins) who was injured prior to the game they lost. That 1988 team was deep had a lot of talented players like Stacy Augmon, Mitch Richmond, Danny Manning etc. who would have crushed the USSR team under NBA rules by running them out of hte gym after 48 minutes but under the FIBA rule set, simply didn't have the shooting that they needed Fast forward to 1996 - the team had the greatest collection of centers ever assembled - none of whom was nearly as effective as they were in the NBA. They weren't bad of course (Olajuwon had a pretty mediocre, for him, shooting tournament) but they didn't reallly carry the team or perform as awesomely as one would expect. Fast forward again to 2004 - what did Tim Duncan, the greatest PF of all time, do at the Olympics at the peak of his career? 12 ppg, 9 board. Not a bad performance but not nearly as dominant as we would expect (mostly because he was always in foul trouble that year) Yao has often been easily neutralized in the FIBA game by quicker teams, or at least contained. In fact I'm glad you mentioned him in order to prove my point. This same Spanish team who you claim is a half-baked collection of scrubs just held him to 11 points on 33% shooting two weeks ago The fact that he will go off and destroy Angola doesn't really make much difference when he gets stoned by a "scrub" like Marc Gasol according to you, so....what are you saying now? Also thanks for citing Pau Gasol - in the NBA he is an all-star but not a superstar, at least judging from the way he gets pushed and shoved around like he did in the finals. In the FIBA game he becomes an elite player due to the lack of phone-booth style post play. THe guy lead the whole tournament in scoring - did you not notice? Do you think he does it with a back to the basket power game? If so you are once again wrong.
Argentina was not a blowout either. Yes if you have two players who at the end of their career can potentially claim to be the best that ever played, on one team AND along with a PG who can probably be the best ever in his position, yes I expect them to blowout teams. Especially this Spanish team. Call me bitter all you want. Maybe I just expect more. Yes thats right. If they are not untouchable, then guess what? They underperformed. I was watching the games, the blowouts against weaker international teams and Spain. Guess what? I expected them to blow Spain and Argentina out of the water too. They didn't and I am disappointed. It hurts the league's reputation when you send the very best players and they are given a run for their money by yes NBA scrubs and Pau Gasol.
It hurts the NBA when NBA players are given a run for their money by other NBA players - dude you are taking bath in stupid lake and lathering yourself up with idiot soap. There is a dumbass towel hanging from the tree of ignorance. It is calling you....
Ok I can't argue against this because I don't have anything to disprove that other than using subjective examples and attributing it to the rules. I do however think Zone defense is probably the biggest rule change that takes away the athleticism advantage of our players. Which results in them looking like mediocre players as compared to how they play in the NBA.
dude you serious? It was a type because first there is only Pau who currently plays in the NBA in the Spain team that played in the finals. Second, let me play along, you hype up players like Kobe, Lebron etc and they struggle to beat scrub players (from whichever league), it doesn't hurt the league's reputation. Do I even have to explain this?? wtf?
I watched the Argentina game and it was never close after Ginobili went down. Sure, Scola went off and Argentina remained competitive but it was something like a 15 pt lead going into the 4th and they won by 20. I'm sorry but that's not a close game. Again, here we are discussing something so trivial and blatantly stupid. They won convincingly in EVERY game. The gold medal game was the only game that was even remotely close and they never trailed outside the 1st quarter and still won by double figures! We can sing, dance, do cartwheels and play hop scotch with this topic all you want. You're in the minority for a reason. We'll just leave it at that. You speak as if we dominated Athens in 2004 and were defending our crown. Let me get this straight: you believe the NBA hurt it's reputation by defeating the defending champions and winning a gold medal? Forgive me for not believing that type of warped logic.
The Spain game was as close as it could be. Again, I think we under performed with our talent as compared to our opponent, fine let me add in the finals and you think we didn't. Good for you. You can't change my mind, I can't yours. We had an excuse, at least I did, in that we didn't have our best players including kobe and we had players like Battier?! Come on, the past two times that was at least a semi valid excuse. This team has none, nada excuses period. We were at full strength. Every position was stacked with potential all time best players.
They blew out the "scrub" players and then beat them again - the best of whom are heading to the NBA. I don't know how many times I have to tell you that Gasol and Fernandez are heading to Memphis and Portland next year and are about as much "scrub players" as Derrick Rose or Greg Oden or any other valuable prospect who has yet to take part in an NBA. Even if they weren't, in FIBA games, some players have good games no matter who the competition is. Aussie midget Shane Heal put up 28 points against John Stockton and Gary Payton in 1996 - which helped him to a cup of coffee with the T-wolves. Do you consider Stocktoon and Payton or the 96 squad to be irreperably tarnished because of this? If you were consistent at all you would, but you're not so you won't be.
Yeah, we'll just have to agree to disagree on this one. I'm sure we could try to get Team USA to issue a formal apology for disappointing you with their convincing gold medal victory but I wouldn't hold my breath on that one if I were you. ...again, your arguments and logic continue to run around in circles. I don't care how many top players elected not to participate in 2004. Do you mean to tell me you think a team with Duncan, the 2003 guys, AI, Marbury, Odom, Amare, Marion, Richard Jefferson, Okafor, Boozer and Battier is LACKING in the talent department? That, THAT group of talent wasn't hands down the most talented group on the floor in the FIBA tournament? After all, the entire premise of every argument you have made is based off our talent advantage. It was our talent advantage that enabled us to win, it was our talent advantage that enabled us to blow out every if they played to their potential, and so on. Using your logic our 2004 bronze medal finish should signal the coming of the apocalypse.
Did I deny that? but they are not yet NBA players. And tell me you didn't compare Rose and Oden to them. Yes these Spanish players are heading to the NBA and will be "scrubs" because they were not drafted high unless they prove themselves. Teams spend millions scouting for players, if these guys didn't rank high up the chances are they aren't as good. No I don't. I never said tarnished, I just said hurts the NBA league. Anyways, will I complain about our PGs play after that game even after a win? You bet. Will I be wrong to say that I am disappointed with our PGs play? Nope. Now replace PG with US team and I don't know what all the fuss is about if I point out that we underperformed as a team in the finals.
