It's frequently stated (to the point of being cliched) a variation of the logic - "The world championships are more important than the Olympics in basketball to international (non-american) players" Now, I scoff at this and think it's silly to think that international players "mail it in" while in pantheon of the Olympics yet somehow "turn it on" in the world championships playing to half-empty auditoriums in Indianapolis because the WC's are "more important". I didn't see Ginobili throwing his gold medal into the toilet two years ago. Nor did I see the international teams playing at a higher intensity level in 1998 when Rudy took a rag-tag bunch of CBA players & UFA's to the bronze. As a player, if I had to do one or the other - the two-week pageantry & spectacle of being an Olympian, and even better, an Olympic gold medalist as part of a legacy that stretches back hundreds, and even thousands of years trumps the basketball WC medal easily - and that's the way the US has treated it (see below) That is why in most sports (with Soccer being the notable exception), the world championships (like in Track or Ice Hockey or Ice Skating) are essentially fill-ins that arose after the fact to allow for int'l competition in non-olympic years. No track athlete woudl say that the WC's are bigger than the olympics, nor would any figure skater, skier, hockey player, swimmer, vollyeball player, etc etc etc. As far as establishment of each goes, the same holds true in basketball - which FIBA put into the Olympics in 1936, while FIBA didn't hold a WC until 1950 - conveniently timed to fill in the gaps between Olympics. So why would people say the WC's are more important? it's the same teams, same kind of tourney, same length, same everything as the Olympics - just with a lot less tradition and without the additional prestige of the Olympics. Then I looked at the history of the WC's - rather than being domnated by a single team that never lost a game for 50 years (save the robbery in 1972 but that's a different story) the basketball WC's have had many different winners (Yugoslavia 5x, Russia/USSR 3x, USA 3x Argentina 2x Brazil 1x - even Chile and the Phillipines have medaled). Why the different result for the US? Well generally the WC's were treated as an afterthought - we generally sent the college "B" team for most of that time period, I believe. So, this will no doubt be objectionable for me to say it - but I think the fact that the WC's are the only full-scale international tourney that non-American teams had a chance to win from 1950-1988 and 1992-2000 has a LOT to do with the fact that this cliche is repeated, and maybe even believed (as I said earlier - on the court it doesn't appear to make much difference). Now, the opposite can be argued from the other side - but it's simply a fact that the US does in fact look at the Olympics as a bigger deal (and so did FIBA apparently, since it waited 14 years after the Olympics to start up a WC) and most athletes in other sports, regardless of nationality, look at the Olympics as a bigger deal than the WC's as well. Now, no doubt this will be construed as american arrogance - but there's also a grain of truth to it at least.
The Olympics used to be for non-professional athletes. Once a sport goes professional, the real world competition of that sport begins to shift to the pro game. Soccer is not the only "exception" by your count. I mean, who cares about Olympic baseball, or boxing, or tennis, or golf, or even cycling? Now, the Olympics have involved professionals too. Things are a little different now.
Most of your comparisons do not work - (and to be fair, the reason why Olympic soccer is not bigger than the WC is because FIFA doesn't want it that way, and so the Olympic soccer tournament is limited to U21 teams IIRC.) Tennis and golf are "on-again, off-again" as Olympic sports - some years they are medal sports, some years they are not. The Ryder Cup and the Davis Cup have much longer and storied histories than Olympic Tennis or Olympic basketball. Also, in tennis and Golf, you get paid per win - which is not so in most team sports. Dwayne Wade doesn't get paid for winning a gold medal, but then he makes millions (save some comparatively small incentives & playoff 'shares') anyway no matter if he's in the lottery or the nba champ. Accordingly the lack of a monetary reward in the Olympics severely inhibits tennis and golf as far as prestige value in a way that is different from other sports. Baseball is not even an olympic sport anymore, and, let's face it, international baseball competition is still in its infancy compared to basketball, which has been happening since the 1936 Berlin Olympics. Olympic cycling gathers the same caliber of cycling as regular competition - especially indooor velodrome cycling - where an olympic gold is undoubtedly the top prize. All Americans ever hear about cycling, is the tour de france - true, but obviously in a 2 week long Olympics you can't replicate that, so the basis of comparison is flawed. That leaves us boxing - boxing doesn't even have an organized league or leagues to begin with, merely a corrupt alphabet soup of "governing" bodies, but anyway let's face it, amateur boxing is really a different sport entirely, with different rules and standards, etc. But if you're arguing that amateur boxing "world championships" are more highlyl sought after than Olympic golds - you're dead wrong, and there is no doubt in my mind about that. This is not so for basketball, there is no difference whatsoever between the Olympic tourney and the WC tourney --- except the WC tourney has less history, less panache, and is on a smaller stage. The only meaningful difference that i can see would lead somebody to insist it was is the fact that I identified: Non US teams have traditionally had a good chance of winning. Not so for the Olympics.
Sam, I agree that history/tradition has a lot to do with prestige, and the Olympics do have the advantage of history in most sports. However, you missed my point in pointing out the differences of forms of competition in the sports I listed as examples of exception. My point was, the highest level of competition almost always takes on the largest stage. And the highest level is usually the professional national teams competition (if the sport has one). World Cup soccer is the highest level of competition of the sport, just like the Wimbleton in Tennis, the tour de france in cycling, etc. For basketball, it's not the WC or the Olympics, it's the NBA. You know how much I despise the "world champion" label for NBA champion. Yet I never deny that the NBA, not the Olympics, not the WC, is the highest level basketball competition in the world. Basketball is still lopsidedly American, sort of like Sumo is Japanese (sort of ).
Oh, I agree totally that the int'l bball is secondary for most, and this is especilly true for American players. It is becoming more true for Int'l teams as well (witness defending 'champ' Serbia Montenegro led by seasoned pros literally mailing it in in Athens) As a sidelight - as the $$ and exposure in club soccer gets bigger, it's intersting to note how the World Cup seemed sort of 'secondary' on the minds of many european players this year. In June/July, you did not see the same Ronaldhino or Gerrard that we saw in UEFA or EPL earlier that year.
Terrible examples: Because the Olympics are played at the same time as the MLB season, the best players don't get to play. Olympic boxing is extremely corrupt in the judging. (One of my dad's friends, Bubba Busceme was an olympic boxer.) Olympic tennis is an on again, off again sport. Olympic Golf was last played in 1904. The Olympics for cyclists isn't the Tour de France, but I would imagine it's a pretty big deal.
That's exactly my point. Nobody cares about Olympic baseball because it is not the highest competition for the sport. If the Olympics were the biggest stage for baseball, you can bet that the MLB would work their schedule around it.
Olympics = WC If the US team won't win this, NBA has no right to call future champion as World Champions, not even Miami.
you realize the nba is the best players from all around the world and not just American players, right?
Never mind disecting every example Easy gave. They might be flawed, but that doesn't automatically mean he is wrong. I don't actually know if the olympics where a non-pro basketball tournament, but wasnt it so? and pros were allowed for the first time in the olympics where the first dream team competed? If so: Olympics used to be for non-pros so it was not as good a tourney as the WC. Also the US would have had a big advantage with their college players (no other country that I know of has amateur leagues of such high quality).
And that's why it should be named NBA Champion. It's not called World Basketball Association. Besides, can you name the last foreigners to win an NBA Championship? And you CANNOT SAY Hakeem Olajuwon. World Cup = World Cup Champions
I look forward to and watch the Olympics ~ I watch the WC's if I happen to catch it... The Olympics are a much bigger deal to win then the WC's.
IMHO it is strange that the nba champions can call themselves worldchampions. It is not about which competition is the strongest. The With soccer, the Champions league champions do not call them selves world champions, they call themselves champions league winners, because that is what they are, it doesn't matter that it was the hardest competition, and the best of all over the world participated, they won the champions league, not the world championship. So it is strange that NBA champions call them selves world champions, because it WASN'T the world championships, they are nba champions. The world doesn't end with the American competitions (Do the NHL and NFL and MLB champions also call themselves World champions?)
"Let me win, and if I cannot... let me be brave in the attempt" as a Ex. track and field athelete... I can't tell you how much grueling and painful...it was to aspire to just make it to the Olympics... knowing the monatary gain would probably be slim to nil... what drove me was the thoughts of representing ones country and holding a gold medal in ones hand... to me the Olympics are the still the purest and most grand of all sporting events... it may not be for many team oriented disciplines, like soccer, baseball, basketball etc... but for many events where 1 individual competes againts others... having only himself/herself to rely on... the Olympics are at the pinncle of ones aspirations... best example I can think of is Michelle Kwan... winner of multiple WC.. the best ice skater in the world for so many years.. but her career will always be tainted because she did win gold in the Olympics... how can anyone compare the WC or NBA finals to the Olympics who only come around once every 4 years...
I don't know. If you ask any NBA player if he had to choose between winning an NBA title or winning an Olympic gold, I am not sure which he would choose. For a role player, he might think Olympic is sweet. For a superstar, leading a team to win in the NBA is probably the highest achievement any basketball player can have.
The players they prefer the NBA because thye get paid a lot of money and in the Olympics and the WC not or just a little compared to what they make in the NBA.
Soccer players don't get paid nearly as much for playing in the World Cup than playing for their own club. But almost all soccer players would consider winning the World Cup the highest achievement they can get. Money is certainly a major factor. But fame and pride is important too.
