why is it that every year an nba team wins the championship, they are called "world champions"? what about the argentinian team that won the gold medal at the olympics? aren't they the REAL world champions?
Because the NBA can call their champion whatever they want to. If some euroleague wanted to call their championship team the World Champs, there'd be nothing that anyone could do to stop them. I think the NBA can legitimately call their team the world champion, because, without a doubt, the NBA finals winner is the best professional team in the entire world. Is there another professional team outside of the NBA that could even come close to competing with the Spurs in a best of 7 series? I doubt it. Because Manu is both on the Spurs and the Argentenian team, this would never happen...But lets take the Pistons and play them against the Argentenian national team in a best of 7 series. I think you and I both would put our money on the Spurs to win...
Now, I know that nobody really likes Argentinians that much, but to call them "Spurs" is going a little too far, don't you think?
i agree u.s. finals champ is the best in the world. but they are also the most nurtured. other countries don't have enough resources to put into sports like u.s. does, american players have an edge. i thought the title "world champions" is some international agreement between teams. i didn't know any country could call their champions within their country "world champions". thanks for clearing it up.
I work with a fella from Nigeria and when I mentioned the Spurs as "world" champs, he had a hissy fit. While I feel his gripe is understandable, I think the NBA is the best basketball league in the world, and it's rosters have the worlds best talent on them. So I don't have a problem with the champion being called "world champ".
It's just a reflection of our belief that our pro-basketball league is the best in the world; same thing for baseball and football.
While it is obvious that the NBA champion is the best basketball team in the world, to call any team of National Basketball Association World championship is pretty silly. I mean, why don't they call themselves World Basketball Association? BTW, after Taiwan won little league WORLD championship however many years in a row, what did they do?
After the '95 Championship I was living in Perth, Australia and the team there (The Wildcats) won the NBL championship. The Rockets played an exhibition game against them and there were some mumblings beforehand about the whole 'World Champion' thing. They didn't even bring Hakeem, but needless to say it was a blowout. The NBA champion team is definitely the best team in the world.
well the NBA is undoubtedly the best league in the world considering all the best players in the world play here. all the guys who help their teams compete with the USA in international competitions are in the nba, so it's pretty obvious the nba is the best league. so the nba champ is the world champ. and as Sam said, we can call them whatever we want, anyways. and i really wonder how a national team like argentina would fare in the nba. the intnat'l game and nba game are so different. guys who can compete with the US in internat'l ball can never dream of playing in the nba. and it's not like the nba wouldn't have them if they were good enough. they'd have a terrible time rebounding, have trouble with perimeter D, and would actually be playing against teams with chemistry and natural roles playing together.
The "we can call it whatever we want" sentiment is exactly why the rest of the world think Americans are arrogant and ignorant. And I know the standard American answer for that is "who cares." But that's a topic for the D&D.
how is it ignorant to say the NBA can call its champ whatever it wants when it can, in fact, call its champ whatever it wants? any league can call its champ whatever it pleases. and Americans are arrogant, but, like people from UT, can you blame us?
