Usa basketball won the gold

nwwarrior09 said:
All of that is by design IMO. It's a very different game than it was 20-30 years ago. Few to none value post play or the mid-range game at the highest levels of basketball anymore, even abroad. Almost all of the better foreign post players are guys that don't play under the basket offensively and are instead more skilled in the ball screen game and as offensive facilitators themselves in space. The skills that are the most valued and in demand offensively have changed substantially.
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The reason the foreign big men develop more ball handling and outside shooting as opposed to a low post game is more likely due to the shape of the lane in FIBA. The NBA lane width is much friendlier to the low post game. That being said, I’m sure at some point basketball coaches realized there aren’t many athletic 7-footers around, so why build a scheme around it anymore?
 
Everyone was quick to point out Kevin Love shouldn't be on the Olympic team, we'll at least he's been relevant more recently than Gregg Popovich. Is it because Pop is a social justice warrior that the media and liberal fans stay off him?
 
nwwarrior09 said:
He was mostly before my time, but he was certainly a legendary scorer that had an absurdly long career in Brazil and Europe. That guy was like 45 when he retired and he was the leading scorer in Brazil's pro league that season.

He might be the only nameable foreign player from the pre-Dream Team era that never played in the NBA.
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Oscar Schmidt, 6'9" Brazillian Olympic star.
 
nwwarrior09 said:
He was mostly before my time, but he was certainly a legendary scorer that had an absurdly long career in Brazil and Europe. That guy was like 45 when he retired and he was the leading scorer in Brazil's pro league that season.

He might be the only nameable foreign player from the pre-Dream Team era that never played in the NBA.
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Oscar Schmidt was actually drafted by the Nets in 1984, but the offer from the Nets was less than he made in Italy playing professionally. Plus back then, NBA players could not play for their home countries, so he couldn't play for Brazil internationally.
 
nwwarrior09 said:
It's incredible how much better the rest of the world has gotten since Barcelona in '92. First in Europe, then in countries like Argentina and Brazil, and now Africa. This has to be the first time the US national team has ever lost to an African country in basketball.

A good reminder that FIBA competition is a different beast. Yes the US has the best talent by far even if some headliners are sitting out, but in international play they risk close games if not losses against teams of NBA benchwarmers, G-Leaguers, and European pros if they don't play hard and with at least some semblance of a team concept. Hopefully this is a good pre-Olympics wake-up call.
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Agreed. 30 years ago those African national teams would've lost to some D3 schools here in the states. That Nigerian team I watched the other night looked and played like a legit basketball team.
 
14Red said:
First of all, this is an exibition game. That's all that needs to be said. It's the super bowl for Nigeria. They may as well turn in the unis and call it a season. They will not be as high as they are right now. That said, this is a mid February NBA game that half the players are going half speed.

The biggest change we've seen in sports over the last 50 years is the day to day "love" of competing. These guys make so much money, they are all buddies on and off the floor and they simply don't "compete" unless it's the championship.

Remember the 1970 baseball all star game. Pete Rose, playing for the host Cincinnati Reds, in an exibition game - which is what the all star game is...RAN OVER the American league catcher Ray Fosse to win the game for the national league. Fosse was out of action for a few months and never was really the same player again. That game meant NOTHING! But for Pete and the players back then, it was bragging rights for their leagues. Sadly we've lost that competition aspect in today's sports.
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Rose basically ended Fosse's career for what? an all-star game?? There's competing and there's being a d!ck. Fine line.
 
I think the biggest change is NBA players be allowed to compete and the number of players playing for their native homeland. If you think about it, we all came from some native homeland.
 
14Red said:
Everyone was quick to point out Kevin Love shouldn't be on the Olympic team, we'll at least he's been relevant more recently than Gregg Popovich. Is it because Pop is a social justice warrior that the media and liberal fans stay off him?
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All-time great coaching resume with a goofy and less than traditional personality...a lot of the basketball media loved him before he started dropping liberal hot takes or hired a woman as an assistant, but those things probably don't hurt.

From the reboot of sorts that took place in 2008 USA basketball has consistently had staffs that have been a who's who of NBA and college coaches. This year is no different between Popovich with Kerr and Jay Wright among his assistants.
 
scbuckeye99 said:
Agreed. 30 years ago those African national teams would've lost to some D3 schools here in the states. That Nigerian team I watched the other night looked and played like a legit basketball team.
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Those guys might be good enough to medal this year. Nigeria is starting to build up a young talent pipeline of potential players between native born guys and 1st generation Americans. They probably should be a top 5-6 FIBA team pretty consistently going forward. It's amazing how much progress they've made since just 2012.
 
scbuckeye99 said:
Rose basically ended Fosse's career for what? an all-star game?? There's competing and there's being a d!ck. Fine line.
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No doubt, but back then, you played hard weather it was for money or not. They played for pride. I'm not sure today's players have much of a sense of team pride. Personal pride yes, team pride? You don't even see it in regular season games anymore.
 
They'll have to do it without Kevin Love who has withdrawn from the team due to an injury. So much for him using the Olympics as a platform to show he is still a top notch player worthy of a trade.
 
nwwarrior09 said:
All-time great coaching resume with a goofy and less than traditional personality...a lot of the basketball media loved him before he started dropping liberal hot takes or hired a woman as an assistant, but those things probably don't hurt.

From the reboot of sorts that took place in 2008 USA basketball has consistently had staffs that have been a who's who of NBA and college coaches. This year is no different between Popovich with Kerr and Jay Wright among his assistants.
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When you're winning, and on top, you can get away with a lot of goofy stuff.

When it goes the other way, it's a bad look.
 
Added JaVale McGee and Keldon Johnson. I thought they might add Darius Garland, but Pop went with his own guy. Besides, it doesn’t look like we’re sending many of our best players anyway.
 
I have always rooted for the USA in every Olympic event of my lifetime, but I found it very satisfying watching this team go down in flames. With players like Dame whining about a trade, ring chaser Durant, big mouth Draymond and Pop as coach…who has become an insufferable pr1k lately, it’s not an easy team to like. And some of the roster is straight garbage. Keldon Johnson and JaVale McGee? And they thought Kevin Love would useful.

I doubt it will happen, but if this team doesn’t medal, I hope it leads to the blowing up of the AAU and “prep” school system in place now, where all the bad habits develop before you even add in the NBA’s lax rules. The international players are getting coached up for real as youngsters and it shows.
 
Embarrassing. France only had three NBA guys and one real star (Gobert) playing. Let an average to above average NBA guard in Fournier go off for 28 points. What players Team USA had or did not have is immaterial; top to bottom they still have by far the deepest and most talented roster...and they lost to a team mostly composed of major European league players with one NBA star and a couple NBA role players.

Money and individualism rule everything in the American system of development between high level AAU and the flourishing prep school system. It has been this way for the last 20-25 years and is only getting worse. Our system of developing and molding the most talented players is trash compared to the best foreign countries, and I don't think there's any going back on it.
 
nwwarrior09 said:
Embarrassing. France only had three NBA guys and one real star (Gobert) playing. Let an average to above average NBA guard in Fournier go off for 28 points. What players Team USA had or did not have is immaterial; top to bottom they still have by far the deepest and most talented roster...and they lost to a team mostly composed of major European league players with one NBA star and a couple NBA role players.

Money and individualism rule everything in the American system of development between high level AAU and the flourishing prep school system. It has been this way for the last 20-25 years and is only getting worse. Our system of developing and molding the most talented players is trash compared to the best foreign countries, and I don't think there's any going back on it.
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Great post nba is so bad now.
 
cjb56 said:
I have always rooted for the USA in every Olympic event of my lifetime, but I found it very satisfying watching this team go down in flames. With players like Dame whining about a trade, ring chaser Durant, big mouth Draymond and Pop as coach…who has become an insufferable pr1k lately, it’s not an easy team to like. And some of the roster is straight garbage. Keldon Johnson and JaVale McGee? And they thought Kevin Love would useful.

I doubt it will happen, but if this team doesn’t medal, I hope it leads to the blowing up of the AAU and “prep” school system in place now, where all the bad habits develop before you even add in the NBA’s lax rules. The international players are getting coached up for real as youngsters and it shows.
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I have no problem rooting against the old angry Marxist they have as their coach.
 
cjb56 said:
I doubt it will happen, but if this team doesn’t medal, I hope it leads to the blowing up of the AAU and “prep” school system in place now, where all the bad habits develop before you even add in the NBA’s lax rules. The international players are getting coached up for real as youngsters and it shows.
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There is a very real chance this team doesn't medal. There's at least a handful of teams in this tournament that they are more than capable of losing to, and they've already lost to three of them between yesterday and the exhibitions. They'll get through to the quarterfinals, but at that point minus a huge turnaround from what we've seen so far they could lose to anyone. I would be shocked at this point if they made it to the gold medal game.

The rest of the world built a legitimate developmental framework valuing both individual development and team development, while for the last few decades our (in theory) higher end of development has largely been a cash grab looking to turn a quick profit, whether it's poorly run AAU organizations and tournaments, shady prep schools, or trying to pimp kids that are high potential assets to colleges, agents, and potential endorsement sources. Nothing will ever change unless the big money aspect of it takes a backseat to development and valuing meaningful practices and workouts over meaningless weekends of playing several unstructured and undisciplined games.
 
Apparently, the definition of communism has changed since I last reviewed it.

This may not only be the least talented Olympic squad in decades, it is also the most unlikable.
 
Pop said afterwards that people shouldn't be surprised that we lost to France? Wtf is wrong with this guy? The NBA game is broken and it showed today.
 
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