How would you rank them if they're part of the NBA league? Guards: Carlos Delfino Emanuel "Manu" Ginóbili Juan Ignacio "Pepe" Sánchez Pablo Prigioni Daniel Farabello Forwards: Leonardo Martín Gutiérrez Wálter Herrmann Andrés "Chapu" Nocioni Luis Scola Centers: Gabriel Diego Fernández Fabricio Oberto Rubén Oscar Wolkowyski Bold players currently in the NBA I like the way the play the game. Nobody is weak, mentally and physically. so I think they can easily get to the second round in the playofffs in either conference.
They would be perenial contenders. They have proven that they are better than our Olympic team full of all-stars.
I disagree. They played as a team in the world events because they were familiar with one another. NBA teams, unlike our Olympic teams, are familiar with one another. I look at that Argentina roster and see one player who you might be able to call a star -- Ginobili -- and then a bunch of players who are average-to-below-average. NBA teams play team ball and have far superior talent. They would crush that Team Argentina.
Team Argentina would probably be of average talent in the east. Manu is the dependable scorer, Oberto provides defense at the most important position, and all of them are 'hustle' guys. The tendency is to compare them with the Spurs because of obvious similarities but they lack comparable substitutes for the two most important reasons for SA success: Tony and Tim. I wouldn't put them higher than 20th best team in the NBA.
Tell that to the Knicks Okay IF WE ARE ASSUMING THAT THEY'RE PLAYING DURING THIS SEASON: I think this team can compete in the East. May even have homecourt advantage. However the long season will drag them down eventually and they won't do very well in the playoffs. ECF would be the ceiling.
You might think that if they entered the league with that roster 2 years ago, the players would have adjusted somewhat by now to the rigours of the NBA and be able to start making contributions. Look at Scola as an example: Here's a guy who is adjusting to the NBA game still, has played hard, earned himself a starting spot, and has become the 'post option' for us late in the season. He's no all-star, but averaging 10 and 6 while shooting 51% from the field shouldn't be sneered at. And as a starter (on 28 minutes) he's shot 53% and averaged 12.5 and 7.5 with almost a steal per game and kept the TOs low. Those aren't terrible numbers for a guy in his first NBA seaso, and one wouldn't be surprised to see Scola emerge as a 16-9 type player [playing on the Rockets will keep his scoring numbers down as obviously he defers to Ming in touches!] Nocioni isn't a horrible player either, scoring 13.4ppg in only 24 minutes off the bench [16.4 in 31 minutes in the 27 games he started] So you could speculate that they'd be decent offensively with Ginobli getting 20i; Scola on 16; Nocioni on 15 and Carlos Delfino would get his 9-10 ppg. And you could be certain that team Argetina would fight and scrap every second of the game while playing great team defense. Would they make the playoffs? No clue, but based on the useful players they already have in the NBA they'd be half a chance.
Team Argentina, if they played an entire NBA season, would probably be a top 4 team and would be perennial contenders, IMO. Their core guys ALL hustle, have very high IQ, play their butts off, and have amazing chemistry/compliment each other perfectly. Oh, and they're talented.
LOL! They would not sniff the playoffs in the West. In the East of course they would be a top four team.
I honestly feel that under NBA rules, they're middle of the pack team. And this is assuming they've played a few years and adjusted to the NBA regular season. They are good, but they're not contenders. If they matched up with the Rockets(with Yao, and assuming Scola clones himself), I'd see us as heavy favorites.
Scola is average to you? yikes! when it comes to dunking the ball, yes they hv far far superior talent. crush is a strong term. without manu, spurs are long gone.
give them rafer alston and yao ming and you have the talent level of the rockets, just not as deep. a starting lineup of: yao, scola, nocioni, ginobili, alston a bench of: oberto, hermann, delfino, sanchez take yao, rafer, bj, and deke off of the rockets and you have the argentine team. how would that team fair? definitely NOT perennial contenders. probably not a playoff team either.
Yes, Scola is average. If you line up all the PF's in the Western Conference, he is not in the top half. The Spurs are not 'long gone' without Manu. He's the third best player on his own team. Plus they won a title without him in '99 and with minimal contributions from him in 2003 when he was a rookie.
that team would not be very good. ginobili has proven he can do some amazing things. could he keep it up 40 minutes a game, 82 games a year like that team would need? maybe, but i have to think the spurs play him 30 mpg for a reason. then nocioni and scola are nice players but nothing more than solid role players, oberto averages all of 5 and 5, delfino is a bench player averaging 9 and 2, and walter hermann barely even plays. while i couldn't say how good the others are, we're talking about 6 nba level players and 3 of them are nothing to write home about. that's not 6 solid role players, that's just 6 total nba level players. that's a damn thin team. having 1 really good nba player, 2 solid players, 3 below average players, and 6 or 7 nbdl or worse level players is not the foundation of a contender or a playoff team or a fringe playoff team. that's a team competing for 20-30 wins. in international ball, having all that talent on one team is pretty formidable, and when they are perfectly suited to the type of ball played in FIBA games, they are really really tough, especially since they've played together for a long time. but we've seen carlos arroyo tear up tim duncan, allen iverson and 10 pretty good nba players and then not get off the bench in the nba. it's just a different game, and that team isn't winning much in the nba. they've also lost 5 of the last 6 to team USA. sucked that that 1 was in the olympic medal round against possibly the worst team USA ever, but they haven't exactly dominated team USA.
