Sedale Threatt wrote:A World All-Star team would be salty as hell.
They'd have the same issues we do in terms of figuring out a hierarchy and who can adjust from being The Guy to slotting into more limited roles. As amazing as they are, Jokic and Doncic might not fit together as seamlessly as you'd think given that they're both used to having an entire system run around them. To say nothing of an SGA, who I could easily see struggling with a more off-the-ball role. But in terms of raw talent, that would be an incredible collection. Frankly, I think they'd beat us more often than not.
And that's where the "world has caught up" notion rings true. For anybody who has been watching the NBA as long as I have (late 80s), the growth of the world talent pool over the past 30-plus years has been remarkable. You had oddities like Detlef Schrempf and Vlade Divac, who were really nice players. But I don't think anybody could have seen the complete sea change coming where the NBA is approaching a full third of its players being from overseas with perennial MVP candidates.
In terms of actual international games, however, it's always going to be an uphill climb because of the numbers game. We have almost 350 million people. Serbia is smaller than five different U.S. metro areas, let alone full states, let alone the entire country. They played an almost perfect game in the first half, had a 15-point lead with less than 11 minutes left, hit 15 3s through 3 quarters and it still wasn't enough. So that's what you're always going to be up against.
The world hasn't caught up. The world is dependent on our next door neighbors for guard play. The world is dependent on guards like SGA and before him Ben Simmons, two guys that played high school basketball in the United States. I would make a rule that if you were playing basketball in the United States before the age of 18, then you can not compete on the world team. The world is trying to beat us with our own products.
