2024 Olympic Basketball Discussion Thread

[Helsbyte]

Now people know why Derrick White is on the team.

Why? Not very impressive vs Germany.

[UcanUwill]

Serbia announced their final 12-man roster. Aleksej Pokusevski, Aleksa Radanov, Dusan Ristic, and Ognjen Jaramaz have been cut.

Vasilije Micic - Charlotte Hornets (NBA)
Bogdan Bogdanovic - Atlanta Hawks (NBA)
Nikola Jovic - Miami Heat (NBA)
Nikola Jokic - Denver Nuggets (NBA)
Marko Guduric - Fenerbahce Istanbul (Turkiye)
Vanja Marinkovic - Partizan Belgrade (Serbia)
Ognjen Dobric - Virtus Bologna (Italy)
Filip Petrusev - Olympiacos Piraeus (Greece)
Nikola Milutinov - Olympiacos Piraeus (Greece)
Aleksa Avramovic - Partizan Belgrade (Serbia)
Dejan Davidovac - Crvena Zvezda Belgrade (Serbia)
Uros Plavsic - Crvena Zvezda Belgrade (Serbia)

Team is pretty sweet, Uros Plavsic is the guy I dont really know, glad Jovic made it at the end. Abramovic move to CSKA has been confirmed I believe, thats the sad part, these dudes have no problem on moving to that place, I liked this team a lot, and Avramovic too, but I dont really like them no more, its just my principles.

Is Micic starting or is Avramovic starting?

[Pokuokic]

Serbia announced their final 12-man roster. Aleksej Pokusevski, Aleksa Radanov, Dusan Ristic, and Ognjen Jaramaz have been cut.

Vasilije Micic - Charlotte Hornets (NBA)
Bogdan Bogdanovic - Atlanta Hawks (NBA)
Nikola Jovic - Miami Heat (NBA)
Nikola Jokic - Denver Nuggets (NBA)
Marko Guduric - Fenerbahce Istanbul (Turkiye)
Vanja Marinkovic - Partizan Belgrade (Serbia)
Ognjen Dobric - Virtus Bologna (Italy)
Filip Petrusev - Olympiacos Piraeus (Greece)
Nikola Milutinov - Olympiacos Piraeus (Greece)
Aleksa Avramovic - Partizan Belgrade (Serbia)
Dejan Davidovac - Crvena Zvezda Belgrade (Serbia)
Uros Plavsic - Crvena Zvezda Belgrade (Serbia)

Team is pretty sweet, Uros Plavsic is the guy I dont really know, glad Jovic made it at the end. Abramovic move to CSKA has been confirmed I believe, thats the sad part, these dudes have no problem on moving to that place, I liked this team a lot, and Avramovic too, but I dont really like them no more, its just my principles.

Is Micic starting or is Avramovic starting?

Starting line up is /has been for the friendlies
C:Jokic
PF: Petrusev/Milutinov (vs France against Wemby/Gobert)
SF: Dobric
SG:Bogi
PG: Avramovic


Micic hogs to much to play with Jokic. Plavisic is a guy who played 4-5 years at Texas and didn't do much came back to play for Mega and just exploded this season playing with Topic/Djurisic, he's extremely mobile 7 footer with great energy not much shot blocking or other skills just moves well without the ball and is a good agitator who will be the back up C/3rd C in the Euroleague this upcoming season. I personally would have cut PLavisic and brought in a 3rd PG (Teodosic/sadly Stefan Jovic and Nedovic both reitred so did Kalanic all would have made it imo) in case of injury cause if it's Guduric running the point it's over.

[UcanUwill]

Serbia announced their final 12-man roster. Aleksej Pokusevski, Aleksa Radanov, Dusan Ristic, and Ognjen Jaramaz have been cut.

Vasilije Micic - Charlotte Hornets (NBA)
Bogdan Bogdanovic - Atlanta Hawks (NBA)
Nikola Jovic - Miami Heat (NBA)
Nikola Jokic - Denver Nuggets (NBA)
Marko Guduric - Fenerbahce Istanbul (Turkiye)
Vanja Marinkovic - Partizan Belgrade (Serbia)
Ognjen Dobric - Virtus Bologna (Italy)
Filip Petrusev - Olympiacos Piraeus (Greece)
Nikola Milutinov - Olympiacos Piraeus (Greece)
Aleksa Avramovic - Partizan Belgrade (Serbia)
Dejan Davidovac - Crvena Zvezda Belgrade (Serbia)
Uros Plavsic - Crvena Zvezda Belgrade (Serbia)

Team is pretty sweet, Uros Plavsic is the guy I dont really know, glad Jovic made it at the end. Abramovic move to CSKA has been confirmed I believe, thats the sad part, these dudes have no problem on moving to that place, I liked this team a lot, and Avramovic too, but I dont really like them no more, its just my principles.

Is Micic starting or is Avramovic starting?

Starting line up is
C:Jokic
PF: Petrusev
SF: Dobric
SG:Bogi
PG: Avramovic


Micic hogs to much to play with Jokic. Plavisic is a guy who played 4-5 years at Texas and didn't do much came back to play for Mega and just exploded this season playing with Topic/Djurisic, he's extremely mobile 7 footer with great energy not much shot blocking.

How good is Petrusev these days? Has he arrived, you dont get OLY contract for nothing. A bit weird Jovic us not starting, but he us young. Micic not starting makes sense, he fits better with bench as a guy who can create, plus Avramovic is elite defender, type of defender where it would translate at highest level no doubt, dude made SGA as miserable as you can.

Also, unrealated. But, Alen Smailagic, what do you think of him? I have seen him many times and he is fine, was he invited to camp? Can he be serious player? I ask, cause Zalgiris signed him and from my understanding, he is Smits replacement, and in streches, Smits was smazing for Z.

As for PG, when you have Jokic, and to extent, Bogdan, you just need a guy who brings the ball down the court, I think you will be fine in playmaking department.

[Pokuokic]

Team is pretty sweet, Uros Plavsic is the guy I dont really know, glad Jovic made it at the end. Abramovic move to CSKA has been confirmed I believe, thats the sad part, these dudes have no problem on moving to that place, I liked this team a lot, and Avramovic too, but I dont really like them no more, its just my principles.

Is Micic starting or is Avramovic starting?

Starting line up is
C:Jokic
PF: Petrusev
SF: Dobric
SG:Bogi
PG: Avramovic


Micic hogs to much to play with Jokic. Plavisic is a guy who played 4-5 years at Texas and didn't do much came back to play for Mega and just exploded this season playing with Topic/Djurisic, he's extremely mobile 7 footer with great energy not much shot blocking.

How good is Petrusev these days? Has he arrived, you dont get OLY contract for nothing. A bit weird Jovic us not starting, but he us young. Micic not starting makes sense, he fits better with bench as a guy who can create, plus Avramovic is elite defender, type of defender where it would translate at highest level no doubt, dude made SGA as miserable as you can.

Also, unrealated. But, Alen Smailagic, what do you think of him? I have seen him many times and he is fine, was he invited to camp? Can he be serious player? I ask, cause Zalgiris signed him and from my understanding, he is Smits replacement, and in streches, Smits was smazing for Z.

As for PG, when you have Jokic, and to extent, Bogdan, you just need a guy who brings the ball down the court, I think you will be fine in playmaking department.

Petrusev in the warm up games has been playing out of his mind while having to defend Lebron/Giannis/Wemby/Rui and the only one who got the better of him clearly was Rui...He's the best fit next to Jokic cause he's mobile enough to defend out and is the only real viable lob threat which Jovic (clearly a more gifted players) does not really provide, Jovic would have been starting had it not been for injury and Petrusev for the warm up games turning into a 2 way player suddenly. Jovic/Milutinov have a great connection from the World Cup so it's good they can play together as well.

Smailagic might be the lowest IQ Serbian player I have seen he's too soft on defense as well but I expect him to play better without the stress of playing for Obradovic to destroy his confidence. If he's replacing Smiths that's a gigantic downgrade. He's got potential I guess and can make some amazing plays but he has not improved at all since coming back from the NBA.

[bb22]

Kerr is in a tough spot with Embiid, with AD clearly being the better fit with the starters. They aren’t really using Joel much on offense, and likely don’t need his types of contributions offensively. They just need big bodies to protect the rim and defend against other bigs. Moving Joel to the Cousins role of ?2014 would probably be the best move.

I assume KD will come back in group stage, off the bench, which will be a good boost. Ant/Tatum will have to fill the Wade (or Westbrook) role. I kind of like Ant’s energy over Tatum right now, and he seems to fit in to lineups easier than Tatum. Tatum shot 45% from 3 in Tokyo… don’t know if he can do that as an off-ball guy this year.

[CodeBreaker]

KD being injured the entire time, and they still don't wanna replace him. Kawhi was playing well during the scrimmages, and they sent him home lol

Honestly, replacing KD with Jaylen Brown would help. The 4 Celtics playing together would have chemistry and play defense.
Replace Zinger with AD. Profit.

Brown has shown he’s not afraid to play big under pressure (ECF and Finals MVP).

They won’t though. This is probably some stupid Kerr PR, guilt, and try to ‘make up for it’ / “yeah, we’re all good even though he left!” kind of stance.

Yea, Brown replacing injured KD and White replacing injured Kawhi are great improvements for this team

[Pachinko_]

Something missing from team Serbia... a good size wing who can create and be a threat from all distances. Bodiroga, Stojakovic, Danilovic, Paspalj, that sort of player, they always had one. Or at least someone like Gurovic.

[TheSheriff]

KD being injured the entire time, and they still don't wanna replace him. Kawhi was playing well during the scrimmages, and they sent him home lol

They really should replace him with Brown. Kind of joke they haven’t.

[_jin]

Dennis Schröder has been named as the male flagbearer for Germany. 3 male basketball players will bear their country's flag on Friday, Schröder, Giannis and Lebron.

[Wingy]

Dennis Schröder has been named as the male flagbearer for Germany. 3 male basketball players will bear their country's flag on Friday, Schröder, Giannis and Lebron.

That and the MVP chants…no wonder he thought he was prime Mike/Lebron late in the 4th.

[Slim Tubby]

Dennis Schröder has been named as the male flagbearer for Germany. 3 male basketball players will bear their country's flag on Friday, Schröder, Giannis and Lebron.

I sure hope Schroeder isn't required to pass the flag off to another national team member. That incident could get ugly.

Sent from my N152DL using RealGM mobile app

[lambchop]

Right but that doesn't change the fact that it's hypocritical to call out someone for "not caring" about something after busting everyone else's balls about how much you didn't care for the past 12 months

PS: And, obviously, the hypocritical part here doesn't refer to you, durden. You're not the one making that claim.

It's not hypocritical if you have evidence to back up your claims. Germany sent their best players to the Olympics, so it's presumable to think they care. There is no evidence that "germany doesn't care".

USA did not send their best players to the FIBA world cup,they did not even send their 20th best team possible, so there's a good argument to be made that the USA doesn't care.

It's not hypocritical to use an evidence based arguement. If my criteria is " teams care if they send their best players, and they dont care if they dont" then it's using a single standard. How is this hypocritical?

If Germany sent their F team to the Olympics and lost, THEN I would say it's hypocritical if Americans to call them out for not caring, because then the situations would be identical.

the situations are not identical in the least.

To make the claim that Americans DO care about the Fiba world cup is denial and you don't even believe that yourself. Just look at the roster they sent compared to the roster they sent to the Olympic and in good faith can you honestly tell yourself they even attempted to win the former?

To make the claim the Germany don't care about the Olympics has no evidence to support it.

Again, I want to stress, nobody claimed that the players on Team USA didn't care during FIBA World Cup. They are saying USA as a whole doesn't care, therefore they did not even send their best players. I am sure, and others are, that the players who showed up, and the coaches who participated, did their best to win each game they played.

In THIS case, people are claiming the German players on the team don't care to win the game or that the coaches did not attempt to gameplan to win the game. That's an entirely different argument.

I

Spoiler:

n last years thread, we discussed Basketball popularity in Germany, and shared this German poll.



Thats what been said, its not about German federation not caring, its about the fact country barely cares about the sport at all, its kind off a stretch to use word care, when the sport is 22nd. place, way behing Triathlon and stuff, so hello, thats what been said.

Basketball in Germany is far less popular than Soccer is in US, far less...

And that country still produce a team that defeats USA, but Americans then have gut saying they are the ones not caring. Hello dude?

Also, just like most contenders, Germans were missing some of their best players, Hartenstein, Da Silva, Kleber, Weiler Babb if I remember missed that tournament, and probably someome else I forgetting.

Spoiler:

Every 5 pages theres a new fool reminding how USA didn't send their best players, but according to them, other teams did. Yes, USA's list of missing players is probably the longest, but Lithuania missed like 8 players from A team, Germany at least 4, those countries still beat USA. Top players miss World cup all the time, how we need to remind this every day to new ignoramus? but its really no one elses problem other federations have bigger success at recruiting at least half of their top guys usually. Every federation tries to recruit best posibble team every year, its their job

.

Great post, I just wanted to clarify that Kleber was barred from the team by Schröder because he broke their three year commitment agreement by not playing in 2022. Therefore, there was no chance of him playing in 2023, Dennis wasn't having that and wanted to keep guys accountable.

As for Hartenstein, he was basically voted off the national team by the players. He was simply too obnoxious as a teenager on the youth national teams and guys hated playing with him. There was already some debate when he was 15 as to whether they could include him on the youth national teams without having everyone else leave out of pure disgust.

He ended up playing 8 games for the mens national team and was never considered ever again. If he somehow joined the team now, I'm assuming everyone else would boycott and just send a bunch of soccer players to participate as Hartenstein's teammates.

[UcanUwill]

It's not hypocritical if you have evidence to back up your claims. Germany sent their best players to the Olympics, so it's presumable to think they care. There is no evidence that "germany doesn't care".

USA did not send their best players to the FIBA world cup,they did not even send their 20th best team possible, so there's a good argument to be made that the USA doesn't care.

It's not hypocritical to use an evidence based arguement. If my criteria is " teams care if they send their best players, and they dont care if they dont" then it's using a single standard. How is this hypocritical?

If Germany sent their F team to the Olympics and lost, THEN I would say it's hypocritical if Americans to call them out for not caring, because then the situations would be identical.

the situations are not identical in the least.

To make the claim that Americans DO care about the Fiba world cup is denial and you don't even believe that yourself. Just look at the roster they sent compared to the roster they sent to the Olympic and in good faith can you honestly tell yourself they even attempted to win the former?

To make the claim the Germany don't care about the Olympics has no evidence to support it.

Again, I want to stress, nobody claimed that the players on Team USA didn't care during FIBA World Cup. They are saying USA as a whole doesn't care, therefore they did not even send their best players. I am sure, and others are, that the players who showed up, and the coaches who participated, did their best to win each game they played.

In THIS case, people are claiming the German players on the team don't care to win the game or that the coaches did not attempt to gameplan to win the game. That's an entirely different argument.

I

Spoiler:

n last years thread, we discussed Basketball popularity in Germany, and shared this German poll.



Thats what been said, its not about German federation not caring, its about the fact country barely cares about the sport at all, its kind off a stretch to use word care, when the sport is 22nd. place, way behing Triathlon and stuff, so hello, thats what been said.

Basketball in Germany is far less popular than Soccer is in US, far less...

And that country still produce a team that defeats USA, but Americans then have gut saying they are the ones not caring. Hello dude?

Also, just like most contenders, Germans were missing some of their best players, Hartenstein, Da Silva, Kleber, Weiler Babb if I remember missed that tournament, and probably someome else I forgetting.

Spoiler:

Every 5 pages theres a new fool reminding how USA didn't send their best players, but according to them, other teams did. Yes, USA's list of missing players is probably the longest, but Lithuania missed like 8 players from A team, Germany at least 4, those countries still beat USA. Top players miss World cup all the time, how we need to remind this every day to new ignoramus? but its really no one elses problem other federations have bigger success at recruiting at least half of their top guys usually. Every federation tries to recruit best posibble team every year, its their job

.

Great post, I just wanted to clarify that Kleber was barred from the team by Schröder because he broke their three year commitment agreement by not playing in 2022. Therefore, there was no chance of him playing in 2023, Dennis wasn't having that and wanted to keep guys accountable.

As for Hartenstein, he was basically voted off the national team by the players. He was simply too obnoxious as a teenager on the youth national teams and guys hated playing with him. There was already some debate when he was 15 as to whether they could include him on the youth national teams without having everyone else leave out of pure disgust.

He ended up playing 8 games for the mens national team and was never considered ever again. If he somehow joined the team now, I'm assuming everyone else would boycott and just send a bunch of soccer players to participate as Hartenstein's teammates.

Yes, I am aware of that, but they are still players that would be in theoretic A team, team A is always a theoretical thing, almost no one has 12 best players they could have, very rarely happens.

I remember after 2005 Fiasco, Serbia NT or the players cut ties, not sure which was which, but it was basically over for any high profile Serbian in the NBA at a time. Funnily enough, Serbia, after Montenegro split, refound success instantly, basically with playets straight out of junior teams, and I remember saying its cool, but imagine if they had all their best players also. One Serbian fan I remembet replied - these are best Serbian players. Looking back, maybe they actually were, but it was the time Radmanovic, Stojakovic and Jaric were still prominent NBA players, but to Serbians, it seemed they didn't exist anymore.

but probably for the best since Teodosic and fellow 22 year olds instantly found success. I was scared how good that team could be in 5 years, but some players just came and went. Like, remember Marko Keselj? For a moment he looked like gratest 22 year old 6'9 shooter ever, but then he just disappeared kind off.

[Karate Diop]

KD gonna have to drag Steph again.

[Repeat 3-peat]

Kevin Durant is on his way to getting his record 4th Olympic Gold medal. There was no way they would kick him off the team.

[NBA4Lyfe]

Team USA needs to not just only LOSE in the Olympics but also not even medal for the politics behind the player selection committee to change. Nike/klutch sports needs to fall flat on their face before something changes

[Dennis Reynolds]

KD being injured the entire time, and they still don't wanna replace him. Kawhi was playing well during the scrimmages, and they sent him home lol

Nobody sent Kawhi home, he's doing the same thing he's been doing ever since his late Spurs days.

For some reason he just refuses to share how bad his injury is which is why you get reports like in 2021 saying he's close to returning when in reality he tore his ACL or the ones in 2023 saying he's day to day despite him having a torn meniscus.

Even this past season they were saying he's not finishing the regular season as some kind of a precaution to get ready for the playoffs if I'm not mistaken.

The baffling thing is why this clown even got the invite in the first place.

[Dennis Reynolds]

Team USA needs to not just only LOSE in the Olympics but also not even medal for the politics behind the player selection committee to change. Nike/klutch sports needs to fall flat on their face before something changes

Considering Harden won his one and only MVP against LeBron - the most prominent Nike/Klutch client in the league and lost to guys who represent different brands and agencies, what exactly is your issue with them?

Not that I'm defending them, I'm well aware these massive businesses and agencies are ran by and full of horrible people, I'm just curious why you're singling them out. If it is due to your magnetic rim sources again, feel free to ignore my question.

[RookieStar]

Dennis Schröder has been named as the male flagbearer for Germany. 3 male basketball players will bear their country's flag on Friday, Schröder, Giannis and Lebron.

I sure hope Schroeder isn't required to pass the flag off to another national team member. That incident could get ugly.

Sent from my N152DL using RealGM mobile app

Hes gonna take it all the way to the..... podium? Thankful its the flag and not the torch he is carrying. You have to pass those.lol