Olympic Qualifiers Results: Brazil, Spain, Greece and Puerto Rico Off to Paris!

[Dr Aki]

Gobert on his tippy toes trying to look taller than Wemby

[Sakkreth]

Refereeing level

[_jin]

Jose Alvarado killing Lithuania out there

[vi3t]

The Americas takes two of the four qualifying spots, who would've thought

[Hellcrooner]

But but but werent nba players better than euroleague players? How did a team bahamas with 3 nba starters lose to a team Spain with one nba bench player ?? As i've always said non superstar nba players are less talented than euroleague players. This game and Fiba world cup games are proof to my claim.

to be honest.
half spanish roster SHOULD be in the nba in differente capacitites, Garuba is 21 only 21 he can still develpo into something, and Aldama could already be a starter in the nba is 23 and has the potentiatl to be = or bettar than hield and or ayton if he develops said potential.

todays game proves also the high prejudice vs europeans in the league

ayton and willy are equally **** deffenders but both can score at will.
who is in the league as an starter and who had to go back to europe tired of being mistreated?

Nuñez---------we will see what he does in the nba, pity that spurs got Cp3 and he (logically ) decided to wait one year instead of riding the pine.

[Nuntius]

Actually i wonder how is it possible that Lithuania is basket crazy and always good, Latvia likes basket and has a midtier decent team that every now and then produces players but Estonia is nothing.

Estonia is Balric country by title, but they are pretty much Scandinavians, but smaller, Basketballl is not much of a thing there.

"Baltic States" by definition includes Estonia

Years ago some Estonian foreign affairs(?) minister declared that Estonia is in Scandinavia, but nobody believed him

Estonia is indeed, by definition, one of the three Baltic states. That is true. But they do not speak a Baltic language like Lithuanians and Latvians. They speak a Finnic language, like Finland. This whole "Estonia can into Scandinavia" is a bit of a meme, I agree, but they are basically cousins with the Finns.

[durden_tyler]

But but but werent nba players better than euroleague players? How did a team bahamas with 3 nba starters lose to a team Spain with one nba bench player ?? As i've always said non superstar nba players are less talented than euroleague players. This game and Fiba world cup games are proof to my claim.

NBA scrubs are way better than Euro scrubs though.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[LuDux1]

Estonia is Balric country by title, but they are pretty much Scandinavians, but smaller, Basketballl is not much of a thing there.

"Baltic States" by definition includes Estonia

Years ago some Estonian foreign affairs(?) minister declared that Estonia is in Scandinavia, but nobody believed him

Estonia is indeed, by definition, one of the three Baltic states. That is true. But they do not speak a Baltic language like Lithuanians and Latvians. They speak a Finnic language, like Finland. This whole "Estonia can into Scandinavia" is a bit of a meme, I agree, but they are basically cousins with the Finns.

it's geopolitical term, language (or religion) is not important

[lambchop]

But but but werent nba players better than euroleague players? How did a team bahamas with 3 nba starters lose to a team Spain with one nba bench player ?? As i've always said non superstar nba players are less talented than euroleague players. This game and Fiba world cup games are proof to my claim.

NBA scrubs are way better than Euro scrubs though.


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Yea Euro scrubs are generally underwhelming. That said, there are players who can excel in the NBA, while just being average with FIBA rules. Domantas Sabonis is another example. He never impacts the game much when playing for Lithuania

[UcanUwill]

But but but werent nba players better than euroleague players? How did a team bahamas with 3 nba starters lose to a team Spain with one nba bench player ?? As i've always said non superstar nba players are less talented than euroleague players. This game and Fiba world cup games are proof to my claim.

Bruh, 3 nba players, 1 good prospect, and 8 randoms, of course Spain beat their ass. If they had 12 Buddie Hield level players, the story would gave been completely different, come on man, you are reaching hard here.

[UcanUwill]

Very disappointing results for us obviously, by third quarter it was over, you could see Lithuanians were hesitant and doubted themselves to take a shot, complete opposite of Italy game. None of our guys could stay in front of anyone, but we hot throught by offensive power and winning rebounds. Today shots did hit and that was all she wrote.

In olympics, I might cheer for Greece the most, but mostly, I will just root against USA.

[UcanUwill]

But but but werent nba players better than euroleague players? How did a team bahamas with 3 nba starters lose to a team Spain with one nba bench player ?? As i've always said non superstar nba players are less talented than euroleague players. This game and Fiba world cup games are proof to my claim.

NBA scrubs are way better than Euro scrubs though.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

It depends what you mean by saying Euro scrub, if you mean Euroleague, even Euroleague scrubs are pretty starsy at FIBA level. Like Balcerowski, he is Euroleague scrub, still fantastic player for Poland, maybe even better than Sochan sometimes. How about Tobey in those Slovenian teams. Tobey was better than Cancar imo, and one is Euroleague scrub and the other wss nba scrub.

Euroleague level is very high at the moment.
But of course, I am not denying that NBA is different beast entirely. But it gets convoluted at the end, Sabonis is NBA star, looks like crap every single year. If i could choose who I wish was Lithuanian, Donantas Sabonis or Mike James, give me Mike James any day.

But then again today, we had team just of Euroleague or nba players, Tubelis I think is the only non Euroleaguer on our team, and we were just crushed by guys who play in Europe, but never got Euroleague contract.

Talent is evening out and is spread out, and with such emphasis on 3 point shooting, lesser players on paper can beat a better team on a good day. Like last year, our Lithuanian team was crap, like 8 first team guys declined, we had to play scrubs like Kariniauskas, and they still beat team USA on a good shooting night. Also we won rebounds badly, that was just Kerr being a clown and in love with small ball.

[Pachinko_]

todays game proves also the high prejudice vs europeans in the league

ayton and willy are equally **** deffenders but both can score at will.

I don't think it's prejudice against European's, it's more the NBA fixation with athleticism. Can't teach wingspan, can't teach length, can't teach hops and other similar stereotypes.

And when you've invested a #1 pick on top of that? Well. Nobody wants to admit it was a screw up.

[UcanUwill]

todays game proves also the high prejudice vs europeans in the league

ayton and willy are equally **** deffenders but both can score at will.

I don't think it's prejudice against European's, it's more the NBA fixation with athleticism. Can't teach wingspan, can't teach length, can't teach hops and other similar stereotypes.

And when you've invested a #1 pick on top of that? Well. Nobody wants to admit it was a screw up.

Top picks get so many chances before being given up. This will be Mo Bambas sixth season, people still exited after signing him, I gave my thoughts on Mo Bamba to Clippers thread.

[lambchop]

But but but werent nba players better than euroleague players? How did a team bahamas with 3 nba starters lose to a team Spain with one nba bench player ?? As i've always said non superstar nba players are less talented than euroleague players. This game and Fiba world cup games are proof to my claim.

NBA scrubs are way better than Euro scrubs though.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

It depends what you mean by saying Euro scrub, if you mean Euroleague, even Euroleague scrubs are pretty starsy at FIBA level. Like Balcerowski, he is Euroleague scrub, still fantastic player for Poland, maybe even better than Sochan sometimes. How about Tobey in those Slovenian teams. Tobey was better than Cancar imo, and one is Euroleague scrub and the other wss nba scrub.

Euroleague level is very high at the moment.
But of course, I am not denying that NBA is different beast entirely. But it gets convoluted at the end, Sabonis is NBA star, looks like crap every single year. If i could choose who I wish was Lithuanian, Donantas Sabonis or Mike James, give me Mike James any day.

But then again today, we had team just of Euroleague or nba players, Tubelis I think is the only non Euroleaguer on our team, and we were just crushed by guys who play in Europe, but never got Euroleague contract.

Talent is evening out and is spread out, and with such emphasis on 3 point shooting, lesser players on paper can beat a better team on a good day. Like last year, our Lithuanian team was crap, like 8 first team guys declined, we had to play scrubs like Kariniauskas, and they still beat team USA on a good shooting night. Also we won rebounds badly, that was just Kerr being a clown and in love with small ball.

I think in FIBA international play it has always been difficult to stop teams with two great offensive perimeter players. Slovenia looked formidable when they had Dragic + a young Luka before he even made the NBA. Then now Puerto Rico with Alvarado and Waters was giving teams fits. Germany has something similar with Schroder and Wagner etc.

Panathinaikos resembled that too with Nunn and Sloukas, but I don't want to downplay the impact of guys like Lessort either. We can go even further back and look at Micic and Larkin etc.

Imo having two scoring guards doesn't necessarily guarantee success in the NBA, but there definitely have been examples of it working well.

[Chuck Everett]

Hernangomez received plenty of chances in the NBA. His issues are defensively. It's not like he only played a year in the NBA. If he was as good as the Gasol brothers or Hartenstein or Zubac or Sabonis or Valancunius, he would be in the league. You can't try to crap on Ayton and then say Willie should be in the league. Explain Alex Len still being in the NBA then?

[UcanUwill]

NBA scrubs are way better than Euro scrubs though.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

It depends what you mean by saying Euro scrub, if you mean Euroleague, even Euroleague scrubs are pretty starsy at FIBA level. Like Balcerowski, he is Euroleague scrub, still fantastic player for Poland, maybe even better than Sochan sometimes. How about Tobey in those Slovenian teams. Tobey was better than Cancar imo, and one is Euroleague scrub and the other wss nba scrub.

Euroleague level is very high at the moment.
But of course, I am not denying that NBA is different beast entirely. But it gets convoluted at the end, Sabonis is NBA star, looks like crap every single year. If i could choose who I wish was Lithuanian, Donantas Sabonis or Mike James, give me Mike James any day.

But then again today, we had team just of Euroleague or nba players, Tubelis I think is the only non Euroleaguer on our team, and we were just crushed by guys who play in Europe, but never got Euroleague contract.

Talent is evening out and is spread out, and with such emphasis on 3 point shooting, lesser players on paper can beat a better team on a good day. Like last year, our Lithuanian team was crap, like 8 first team guys declined, we had to play scrubs like Kariniauskas, and they still beat team USA on a good shooting night. Also we won rebounds badly, that was just Kerr being a clown and in love with small ball.

I think in FIBA international play it has always been difficult to stop teams with two great offensive perimeter players. Slovenia looked formidable when they had Dragic + a young Luka before he even made the NBA. Then now Puerto Rico with Alvarado and Waters was giving teams fits. Germany has something similar with Schroder and Wagner etc.

Panathinaikos resembled that too with Nunn and Sloukas, but I don't want to downplay the impact of guys like Lessort either. We can go even further back and look at Micic and Larkin etc.

Imo having two scoring guards doesn't necessarily guarantee success in the NBA, but there definitely have been examples of it working well.

Guards got so good over the years, they completely changed what is expected from different positions even. Look at Kaminski, flopped in the NBA, not a huge surprise, well, can still be very good in Europe, right? No, guy is flat out liability, gets outplayed of the court by every perimter player. Same with Okafor and others. There are still nba fans, who clearly do not follow international basketball, who think nba did Okafor dirty, or blackballed him or something, this guy barely got any play time on Nigerian NT.

Also, when you have star bigs, you usually still need very good guards to set them up. Yeah, bigs are getting more and more versatile, but still, a lot of them need bigtime guard support. I remember how easy China was in 00s, because they had Yao, but our defense would just front him, and no chinese guard knew how to pass to Yao over our defenses.

Guards is basketball right now. Thats why we had Sabonis and Valanciunas, but sucked entire decade tgey were there, we were blowing competitions out with Saras, Macas and Siskauskas.

[UcanUwill]

Hernangomez received plenty of chances in the NBA. His issues are defensively. It's not like he only played a year in the NBA. If he was as good as the Gasol brothers or Hartenstein or Zubac or Sabonis or Valancunius, he would be in the league. You can't try to crap on Ayton and then say Willie should be in the league. Explain Alex Len still being in the NBA then?

Len is just a good guy, thats my explanation ha. I do not think there is euro bias in the nba, surely there isnt one anymore, but man, Len is not an NBA player, I dont know how he keeps getting those contracts, they just have to like him.

[Chuck Everett]

Hernangomez received plenty of chances in the NBA. His issues are defensively. It's not like he only played a year in the NBA. If he was as good as the Gasol brothers or Hartenstein or Zubac or Sabonis or Valancunius, he would be in the league. You can't try to crap on Ayton and then say Willie should be in the league. Explain Alex Len still being in the NBA then?

Len is just a good guy, thats my explanation ha. I do not think there is euro bias in the nba, surely there isnt one anymore, but man, Len is not an NBA player, I dont know how he keeps getting those contracts, they just have to like him.

Could also be that Len was a top 5 pick and as such still holds some sort of cache when you're selected that high. I don't know either. It's not like he has any potential left. He is what he is.

[Frichuela]

Congrats to Rudy "Screech" Fernández for making history playing in his sixth Olympic Games, by the way.

Congrats are indeed in order!