Minnesota Sports Forum

bleedspeed177 wrote:I always thought it was odd we focused on small ball internationally. I wonder if it makes big guys not want to play on the team.

Brook Lopez didn't get much burn. He struggled and the game should have been perfect for him. He can stretch the floor and has size but doesn't help with rebounding. A guy like John Collins would have been a good player to have on the team. He is a good rebounder and has 3pt range. When you start thinking about NBA players that can play on team USA and you see we don't have a lot of bigs. The international teams dominate there. I know the rules have hampered our guys in the past.

Can Collins actually guard the international centers? Dude is skinny and I'm not sure he is known for being a defender.

Not sure. I was thinking tall American's that can rebounder and shot.

Not many on the list of options over 6-10.

https://www.foxsports.com/nba/stats?season=2018&category=REBOUNDING&group=1&time=0

I didn't pay much attention to last year, but man he would have looked good next to KAT.

bleedspeed177 wrote:Not sure. I was thinking tall American's that can rebounder and shot.

Not many on the list of options over 6-10.

https://www.foxsports.com/nba/stats?season=2018&category=REBOUNDING&group=1&time=0

I didn't pay much attention to last year, but man he would have looked good next to KAT.

While reading an article about Lavine it was noted that Julius Randle left team USA for a family isssue. He was one of the guys that would have qualified for your list.

Also this is an interesting article from Marc Stein.

https://messaging-custom-newsletters.nytimes.com/template/oakv2?uri=nyt://newsletter/3537e81f-6598-4d8a-91d4-4fd7b1e997d6&te=1&nl=marc-stein&emc=edit_msb_20190918

monsterpile wrote:

While reading an article about Lavine it was noted that Julius Randle left team USA for a family isssue. He was one of the guys that would have qualified for your list.

Randle would have been a good player on the team.

That was a good read. If I am the NBA I don't like FIBA trying to make money off my product. I would work that into the next collective bargaining agreement that bans players under contract from playing in other leagues or at least allows a team to void the contract of players that get hurt playing in them.

I know Cuban was vocal on this. I get his point.

bleedspeed177 wrote:

monsterpile wrote:

While reading an article about Lavine it was noted that Julius Randle left team USA for a family isssue. He was one of the guys that would have qualified for your list.

Randle would have been a good player on the team.

That was a good read. If I am the NBA I don't like FIBA trying to make money off my product. I would work that into the next collective bargaining agreement that bans players under contract from playing in other leagues or at least allows a team to void the contract of players that get hurt playing in them.

I know Cuban was vocal on this. I get his point.

Ideally there would be a mutually beneficial partnership between FIBA and the NBA with collaboration that would benefit both organizations. Having said that the NBA doesn't really NEED the FIBA tourney to further their brand at this point. I'd also guess FIBA is more international based and has a different view of these tournaments than NBA folks. In other words I'm guessing there is a cultural difference. As an owner there isn't a whole lot to gain by having your player play in these tournaments except maybe your player adding popularity in another country and upping sales of jerseys etc. I thought stein really laid a lot out there that I was not aware of.

The thing I thought was interesting is I kind of read that article as FIBA might be better off without Team USA being dominate in international basketball. I don't know enough about soccer to know if the big professional soccers stars play in the World Cup for their countries or not. I think where Stein missed the boat was he didn't do the NBA Europe as the NFL did. Think if they would have started a league their instead of development league here. Would there even be a Euroleague today?

bleedspeed177 wrote:The thing I thought was interesting is I kind of read that article as FIBA might be better off without Team USA being dominate in international basketball. I don't know enough about soccer to know if the big professional soccers stars play in the World Cup for their countries or not. I think where Stein missed the boat was he didn't do the NBA Europe as the NFL did. Think if they would have started a league their instead of development league here. Would there even be a Euroleague today?

It's worth remembering that when Stern took over the NBA it was not exactly doing well. The Finals were tape delayed. I think Stern focused on the NBA product and was pretty successful obviously because of some really good players like MJ. I think the idea that NBA owners would have been up for taking their money over to France or whatever when they probably had no interest in even a league like the CBA seems dubious. I guarantee Donald Sterling wouldn't have been willing to pay for that. Lol Stern has done a lot to make it a global game and in a weird twist Marbury's weird journey probably helped the global game a lot too building on Yao Ming's success. The Europe leagues aren't a new thing. Kobe's dad played in them. They had been around for quite a while. My uncle had a cousins that was nearly 7' that played overseas. The sport is really taking off to the point where we have legit NBA prospects going to play down under and they get money and that league isn't a complete joke. The game of basket all has really evolved in my lifetime to a true global game with a TON of money to go around. My cousins went to a small college in Iowa that has a teammate that is playing in some international league somewhere. The school they played for doesn't exist anymore and they only had a basket all program for the 4 years my cousin played. They didn't win a game till his Jr year. But anyway a guy from that team is making money playing in Greece or whatever. If you are a decent Big 10 players and you don't get drafted...if you want to can make a nice enough salary playing overseas. 3 on 3 (3X3) might be the next thing to come along and be worth players times for a solid payday. I'm looking forward to Robbie Hummel dominating in the Olympics and winning a Gold Medal...hopefully.

I was thinking the time for them to capitalize was right after the dream team in 1992. The NBA was at a point it would have made sense. Oddly hockey and baseball are similar yet didn't figure it out. Maybe those sports are just too diluted.