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With many NBA stars already making their summer debuts for their respective national teams, Greece’s superstar Giannis Antetokounmpo has yet to play in a friendly game for his country this summer.

The reason for that may have been revealed. According to Greek outlet SDNA, Giannis’ absence from Greece’s first EuroBasket warm-up games is due to unpaid insurance.

"Giannis’ appearance is just one payment away — a payment that would ensure insurance coverage in case of an accident or bad moment," SDNA reports.

"When will that happen? The national coach wasn’t even sure if Giannis would play on 14/08 in Thessaloniki in the next friendly against Montenegro.”

"Perhaps because the Bucks are waiting to see whether the much-talked-about trade will happen or if Giannis will stay in Milwaukee. Otherwise, the agreement will have to be made with his next team," SDNA notes.

"Logic says the alarm will be over within the next ten days. Still, the HBF (Greek Basketball Federation) remains deafeningly absent and exposed before Greek fans, who wonder why Giannis Antetokounmpo isn’t training with the rest of the team and why he isn’t playing in the friendlies," they add.

Greece have already played three preparation games for EuroBasket 2025, suffering two losses in those outings.

https://basketnews.com/news-229184-reason-for-giannis-antetokounmpo-absence-from-first-eurobasket-prep-games-revealed.html

Either the Greek federation doesn't have the money to pay for Giannis insurance (which is illogical) or something is really going on.

In before the lock. For **** sake this thread gets started every other day.

I hope so, Giannis deserves greener pastures and would win a bunch of rings with a title contender!
Giannis is the greatest player since Jordan retired, the perfect mix of league-best defense (Defensive Player of the Year), league best offense (29.9 point per game on .575 shooting and 6.0 assists per game for the last SIX years), and dragged the Bucks to a championship when arguably nobody in NBA history could ever have with that roster.

The most logical outcome is he goes to Olympiakos

It's much more likely Giannis camp and the Bucks decided he wouldn't play in at least the first few friendlies to keep his fresh and therefore there's no reason to pay unnecessary insurance.

Oh great, this again.

bonita_the_frog wrote:I hope so, Giannis deserves greener pastures and would win a bunch of rings with a title contender!
Giannis is the greatest player since Jordan retired, the perfect mix of league-best defense (Defensive Player of the Year), league best offense (29.9 point per game on .575 shooting and 6.0 assists per game for the last SIX years), and dragged the Bucks to a championship when arguably nobody in NBA history could ever have with that roster.

Not even close.

Giannis has struggled to stay healthy during the regular season when he's had extended international play in the summer. As far as insurance, it shouldn't really factor in.

Nonsense speculation. Giannis isn’t going anywhere and the Bucks will be competitive in the east this year. No team has the assets for Giannis.

Spanoulis confirmed and is well-aware that Giannis is on his own training schedule LOL. Nothing burger.

PG - Porter
SG - Rollins - Trent
C --- Turner - Portis
PF - Antetokounmpo
SF - Prince - Kuzma

If Porter blossoms, Rollins & Prince become solid role-players, Turner somehow averages 17ppg, and they stay healthy, they're easily a playoff team.

Sidenote: Budenholzer should be rehired. I believe he'd help to exalt Turner, Porter, and Rollins.

JayMKE wrote:Nonsense speculation. Giannis isn’t going anywhere and the Bucks will be competitive in the east this year. No team has the assets for Giannis.

OKC has the assets, but doesn’t need him.

No

These rumors have been going on for years now, and he always ends up staying in Milwaukee. I think I'll just take him at face value and believe him when he said he likes living in Milwaukee

In other news. A Gyros stand in Milwaukee has gone out of business. We don´t know if it´s the case, but maybe Giannis eats there sometimes and has told the owner that he plans on leaving the Bucks, so we wrote this article. Main trade destinations for Giannis are the Knicks and Nets, since the state of New York has the most Gyros restaurants of all states with an impressive total amount of 237.

The national federations like the Greek federation, don't pay for the player's insurance. FIBA pays it. And they already have it paid ahead of time.

Giannis is such a freak of nature, 50 points, 14 rebounds, 5 blocks, 16-25 field, 17-19 free-throws in the Championship Game!
Finals averages: 35.2 points, 13.2 rebounds, 5.0 assists, 1.8 blocks, 1.2 steals, .618 field, Giannis is the standard by which basketball excellence is measured...
Hard to believe there will ever be a greater big man than Giannis, because it really is physically impossible... 29.9ppg 11.9rpg 6.0apg and elite defense during his last 6 years!
Guess it makes sense for Giannis to stay in Milwaukee his whole career, because he's probably the only player in NBA history who can lead them to championships, and Batman doesn't even need a Robin... and some Robins aren't good at defense anyway.

I hope not. He pushed and whined and forced the team into his situation, now he should honor his deal and live through it. He tried to LeGM but LeFlopped instead.

Karate Diop wrote:I hope not. He pushed and whined and forced the team into his situation, now he should honor his deal and live through it. He tried to LeGM but LeFlopped instead.

lol you’re persistent about hating on this guy