Larry Brown and the 2004 Olympic Saga

[CrookedJ]

I'm surprised that Larry Brown didn't finish the 2004 Olympics as the coach of Argentina. They were probably in talks.

As for the 9/11 comment , who does he think he is Rudy Guilianni? Thats right Rudy, its all about 9/11 . ..

[steven abooten]

he just full of excuses... not only that the players and coaching staff on that roster wasn't good enough to beat the elite teams at that time and they weren't really prepared either

and everyone know u cant be successful with marburry and iverson as ur PG combo... heck nvm iverson is really good, but marburry just bring complete failure to your team

[Dtown84]

I can't believe he's still making excuses for 04, just take some responsibility and let it die.

[Mad Balla 15]

It's a shame so many players from the 2003 qualifying tournament team rejected their invitations to play in the 04 Olympics. If they had the 2003 qualifying team for the 2004 Olympics they would've won Gold no questions asked.

[Nupe_1911]

The same players LB primarily benched in 04 (Wade, Bron, Melo, Bosh) are the primary ones that led Team USA to the gold in 08. Yet, LB wants us to believe that he has no responsibility? LoL!

Furthermore, rather then push for an uptempo game with 3/4 court presses, full court presses and traps, LB opted to play more of a half court safe defensive game. This was a total and complete failure to maximize the teams advantage (speed and athleticism).

Now, Brown is a good coach but the reality is that he did not do a good job. Period.

The players take some blame but LB takes the majority of it in my opinion.

[East_Coast]

The players take some blame but LB takes the majority of it in my opinion.

I second that. I'm sure I wasn't the only person screaming at the tv in a desperate plea for more aggressive, full-court defense in 2004. Larry had the horses, he just didn't let them run free. He deserves most of the blame, and this attempt to pass of responsibility is incredible shallow.

Good luck, Charlotte. Looks like you'll need it.

[Bernman]

He did a sub-standard job coaching that team. Especially over-playing Marbury who was incessantly ball dominating. But he's not incorrect in saying that the terrorist attacks prevented many of our top players from justifying going to Greece, and if not for that situation we probably would have won gold comfortably enough. Players said expressly it was the reason why they wouldn't travel after helping us qualify. Why else would Jason Kidd, T-Mac, Kobe Bryant (withdrew for injury), Vince Carter, Jermaine O'Neal, Karl Malone, Ray Allen, and Mike Bibby help us qualify for the Olympics, but then refrain from playing in them. They weren't even able to enjoy the fruits of their labor. Yeah, NBA stars would rather play in obscurity, then on the big stage in the Olympics. It's not like team USA would have been much better off with the squad who won the gold in Puerto Rico in '03 Olympic qualifying. They only beat Argentina by 33 and 8 points respectively and the home country by 26 and 16. The very same teams we were easily handled by in the Olympics.

[TrueRain]

He's actually right. This isn't an excuse for why we lost but this is an excuse of why are best players didn't even play that year. A lot of them were dropping out because of security reasons. I remember it very distinctly.

And next time try giving the actual quote instead of taking it out of context.

[SpeedyG]

He did a sub-standard job coaching that team. Especially over-playing Marbury who was incessantly ball dominating. But he's not incorrect in saying that the terrorist attacks prevented many of our top players from justifying going to Greece, and if not for that situation we probably would have won gold comfortably enough. Players said expressly it was the reason why they wouldn't travel after helping us qualify. Why else would Jason Kidd, T-Mac, Kobe Bryant (withdrew for injury), Vince Carter, Jermaine O'Neal, Karl Malone, Ray Allen, and Mike Bibby help us qualify for the Olympics, but then refrain from playing in them. They weren't even able to enjoy the fruits of their labor. Yeah, NBA stars would rather play in obscurity, then on the big stage in the Olympics. It's not like team USA would have been much better off with the squad who won the gold in Puerto Rico in '03 Olympic qualifying. They only beat Argentina by 33 and 8 points respectively and the home country by 26 and 16. The very same teams we were easily handled by in the Olympics.

Kidd had the microfracture surgery so he couldn't play. Kobe had legal issues and the elbow injury. Ray Allen and his wife had their first child, I think Vince got married. I don't remember JO or Malone's excuse (I think this might have been Malone's last years, so he bowed out).

Bibby was the main guy I remember who used safety concerns as the reason he didn't come back for the Olympics.