Official Eurobasket 2013 Thread

[Nolan]

My God, Travis Diener is playing for Italy???

[Rasho Brezec]

It's fun watching McCaleb play, but it's also stupid how anyone can get a citizenship to play in this thing. It's turning into club basketball.

[JV4MVP]

My God, Travis Diener is playing for Italy???

The Italian from Wisconsin

[sisibilio]

It's fun watching McCaleb play, but it's also stupid how anyone can get a citizenship to play in this thing. It's turning into club basketball.

But only 1 nationalized per team, so it's OK, it allows teams to cover for huge holes in certain positions but still keeps it somewhat bearable.

BTW the unbalance in the grouping is grotesque.

[Toxicity]

My God, Travis Diener is playing for Italy???

The Italian from Wisconsin

His wife has italian parents so Travis could become italian citizen after 3 years spent in Italy... He took the italian passport just a couple of months ago.

[kakaman]

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PrLl7BNNFns[/youtube]

[rottenzombie]

Italy vs Finland could be fun, two surprise teams of this tourney. Too bad I might not be able to watch it.

[aporel18]

Yeah Slovenia really took it to the spanish d-bags.
Great game. Props to the slovenian center who lost a tooth and still played great in the 4th.

spanish d-bags? that's funny as hell, kid. Any other great joke?

Not having Pau, Ibaka or Mirotic, let alone veterans like Navarro or Reyes will do that to a team... melting down under home team pressure. Nothing to argue, good win for the Slovenians.

Elimination games will be another animal, though. I think Greece, France and Lithuania are Spain's biggest rivals when it's win or go home. Calderon needs to play off the ball, with Ricky and Rodríguez setting him for open 3s, and Marc needs to rest a bit more. Spain has done nothing to deserve the favorite label, so they'll need to go game by game.

No joke, I despise the way guys like Fernandez play the game. Always acting, complaining and flopping.
And Marc knocked a tooth out of a guy and didn't check once to see if he was okay.

Well, I get that Rudy and Navarro can flop like crazy, but you can't label the rest of the Spanish players as d-bags for that. But I find it funny because they were playing against Goran Dragic of all players in the world. Do you think all Slovenian players are the same because of crazy Goran behavior? Wrong generalization is wrong.

And Marc is a noble player, and things like that happen in basketball games. He also was talking to Vidmar after the game, and you could tell he didn't mean to injure him.

[NOODLESTYLE]

It's fun watching McCaleb play, but it's also stupid how anyone can get a citizenship to play in this thing. It's turning into club basketball.

But only 1 nationalized per team, so it's OK, it allows teams to cover for huge holes in certain positions but still keeps it somewhat bearable.

BTW the unbalance in the grouping is grotesque.

They're only considered naturalized if the player gets citizenship after the age of 16. Teams in other FIBA zones are exploiting that by getting players from other countries and they're not considered naturalized because of dual citizenship at an earlier age.

[aporel18]

Spoiler:

Yeah Slovenia really took it to the spanish d-bags.
Great game. Props to the slovenian center who lost a tooth and still played great in the 4th.

spanish d-bags? that's funny as hell, kid. Any other great joke?

Not having Pau, Ibaka or Mirotic, let alone veterans like Navarro or Reyes will do that to a team... melting down under home team pressure. Nothing to argue, good win for the Slovenians.

Elimination games will be another animal, though. I think Greece, France and Lithuania are Spain's biggest rivals when it's win or go home. Calderon needs to play off the ball, with Ricky and Rodríguez setting him for open 3s, and Marc needs to rest a bit more. Spain has done nothing to deserve the favorite label, so they'll need to go game by game.

Well Slovenia is playing without Beno Udrih, former NBA players Vujacic, Brezec and without one of the best players in Euroleague, Erazem Lorbek. So its quite even on that front.

I wouldn't write Slovenia off, maybe not as much talent on their roster as in mentioned teams, but those young boys have that warrior mentality, with extra help from the home crowd, anything is possible.

No, it's not even on the talent front. I know Erazem is not playing, and he's a great player, wasn't making excuses for the absent players. But if you compare who could be playing for each team, there's a big difference in talent for Orenga's team. And it's not even on the court, either, but Slovenia has one of the best coaches in FIBA basketball in Bozidar Maljkovic, while Spanish coaching crew has a lot of talent but also a lot to learn. They got schooled by the master, no excuses.

What I was trying to say is that when you lack some of your best players AND leaders, you may not respond well to the pressure of playing against home court. But it's a long tournament, so I expect them to improve, mostly Orenga and his crew, who should fix their rotations and maximize their backcourt superiority.

I wouldn't write Slovenia off, either, they've shown they can play with anyone and they just beaten Spain, but the elimination rounds are very different, and upsets are far less likely than in the group stage. And Greece, Lithuania and France, on paper, have the best chance because of their talent, alongside Spain. But basketball isn't played on paper, so I guess we'll enjoy great games and emotion if they decide to go to the basket and score more than 60 points a game.

[aporel18]

Wow what an ego from Mirotic, if true. 22 year old Mirotic with almost zero experience with Spain national team, doesn't want to play second fiddle to Ibaka, one of the best defensive bigs in NBA.

Things like this really annoy me. You don't play for your national team for personal stat sheet, it's for pride. Well he is Montenegro born, questionable affection towards Spain.

Well, in modern sport world, things like media exposure and image rights have more to do with National Team playing than pride. Of course, all those guys will tell you it's about pride, but in the end it's about money pride.

I didn't get why Mirotic refused to play for Spain at first. It might be that he doesn't want to be second fiddle to Ibaka, or maybe he's just trying to get a compromise to play for Spain in 2014 World Championships, which is the second best stage after the Olympics for basketball players. He and his agent may know what's best for his future, but I'd probably be playing if I was him. Having the chance to play, you should use that chance.

Mirotic has played for Spanish underage National Teams, earning the MVP in his U20 European championship in Bilbao, so I don't think it's about affection. He could be playing with Montenegro if he wanted, too, making a formidable big rotation with Vucevic and Pekovic. But I guess he'd rather form an even better big rotation with Marc Gasol and Ibaka going forward, when Pau and Reyes retire from NT after 2014.

[Euro77]

Spoiler:

spanish d-bags? that's funny as hell, kid. Any other great joke?

Not having Pau, Ibaka or Mirotic, let alone veterans like Navarro or Reyes will do that to a team... melting down under home team pressure. Nothing to argue, good win for the Slovenians.

Elimination games will be another animal, though. I think Greece, France and Lithuania are Spain's biggest rivals when it's win or go home. Calderon needs to play off the ball, with Ricky and Rodríguez setting him for open 3s, and Marc needs to rest a bit more. Spain has done nothing to deserve the favorite label, so they'll need to go game by game.

No joke, I despise the way guys like Fernandez play the game. Always acting, complaining and flopping.
And Marc knocked a tooth out of a guy and didn't check once to see if he was okay.

Well, I get that Rudy and Navarro can flop like crazy, but you can't label the rest of the Spanish players as d-bags for that. But I find it funny because they were playing against Goran Dragic of all players in the world. Do you think all Slovenian players are the same because of crazy Goran behavior? Wrong generalization is wrong.

And Marc is a noble player, and things like that happen in basketball games. He also was talking to Vidmar after the game, and you could tell he didn't mean to injure him.

And where in my post did I say that I meant the entire spanish team?
It's a fact that the entire team has a flair of arrogance and entitlement. Sure, they earned some of it through their many, many wins, but it makes them also really, really unlikable.
And this just gets amplified thousandfold by the annoying behaviour of the likes of Fernandez, Navarro, Calderon, etc.
(the d-bags)
For the record I know Gasol didn't try to injure Vidmar (he didn't even see him when he made that move) and if he checked on him after the game that's fine, I turned the game off after the final buzzer.

[NOODLESTYLE]

Mirotic has played for Spanish underage National Teams, earning the MVP in his U20 European championship in Bilbao, so I don't think it's about affection. He could be playing with Montenegro if he wanted, too, making a formidable big rotation with Vucevic and Pekovic. But I guess he'd rather form an even better big rotation with Marc Gasol and Ibaka going forward, when Pau and Reyes retire from NT after 2014.

According to reports, Mirotic got his Spanish citizenship in 2010 and therefore is considered naturalized. If that's true, both Ibaka and Mirotic can't be on Spain's roster unless more than 1 naturalized is allowed. BJ Mullens wanted to play for the British team in the 2012 Olympics, but they also had another naturalized player on the team. Mirotic would have been eligible in this tournament though due to Ibaka's absence.

[Rasho Brezec]

It's fun watching McCaleb play, but it's also stupid how anyone can get a citizenship to play in this thing. It's turning into club basketball.

But only 1 nationalized per team, so it's OK, it allows teams to cover for huge holes in certain positions but still keeps it somewhat bearable.

BTW the unbalance in the grouping is grotesque.

It's still stupid. They should have them pass the language test of the country they play for.

[SportsGuy8]

Yeah, it's quite ridic how so many of the "smaller" teams have the token black PG.

I don't even mind naturalized players that much, but the requirements shouldn't be as loose.

For example, I don't mind Luol Deng playing for GB during the Olympics. He has some real ties there. Or Serge Ibaka playing for Spain ... no problem there. Or a random player who played in one country for many years ...

But the case of McCaleb is quite ridic and shows a serious flaw:

“I was playing in Serbia last year and I got a call from the Macedonians — they asked me to play for them,” explained McCalebb, who grew up in the Algiers section of New Orleans…. “I didn’t ask any questions about the place,” he said. “I just said, ‘Yes,’ and I got a plane for Skopje the next day.”

Three days later, Bo McCalebb had morphed into Borche McCalebbovski, a newly minted citizen of a country he was previously only vaguely aware of.

“Every team has the right to one naturalized player,” explained Dejan Lekic, the secretary general of Macedonia’s basketball federation. “He came, he liked our country, he liked us and everyone liked him. He is Macedonian in full now.”

I mean, c'mon.

P.s.: And this is coming from me, someone who's very anti-nationalism.

[WhateverBro]

It's fun watching McCaleb play, but it's also stupid how anyone can get a citizenship to play in this thing. It's turning into club basketball.

But only 1 nationalized per team, so it's OK, it allows teams to cover for huge holes in certain positions but still keeps it somewhat bearable.

BTW the unbalance in the grouping is grotesque.

It's still stupid. They should have them pass the language test of the country they play for.

So it's as stupid as when Hakeem played for team USA, no? Patrik Ewing was 12 when he came to the US, is that ok?

Where do you believe the cutt-off should be at? And based on what?

[shokase]

http://Www.livebasketball.tv.

is it free?

[SportsGuy8]

But only 1 nationalized per team, so it's OK, it allows teams to cover for huge holes in certain positions but still keeps it somewhat bearable.

BTW the unbalance in the grouping is grotesque.

It's still stupid. They should have them pass the language test of the country they play for.

So it's as stupid as when Hakeem played for team USA, no? Patrik Ewing was 12 when he came to the US, is that ok?

Where do you believe the cutt-off should be at? And based on what?

C'mon, compare Hakeem & Ewing, who were both already playing, living and had families in the country for 10+ years, to this:

“I was playing in Serbia last year and I got a call from the Macedonians — they asked me to play for them,” explained McCalebb, who grew up in the Algiers section of New Orleans…. “I didn’t ask any questions about the place,” he said. “I just said, ‘Yes,’ and I got a plane for Skopje the next day.”

Three days later, Bo McCalebb had morphed into Borche McCalebbovski, a newly minted citizen of a country he was previously only vaguely aware of.

“Every team has the right to one naturalized player,” explained Dejan Lekic, the secretary general of Macedonia’s basketball federation. “He came, he liked our country, he liked us and everyone liked him. He is Macedonian in full now.”

Oh, sorry, you're right, no real difference.

[Euro77]

http://Www.livebasketball.tv.

is it free?

Unfortunately not.

[Ganji]

It's fun watching McCaleb play, but it's also stupid how anyone can get a citizenship to play in this thing. It's turning into club basketball.

But only 1 nationalized per team, so it's OK, it allows teams to cover for huge holes in certain positions but still keeps it somewhat bearable.

BTW the unbalance in the grouping is grotesque.

It's still stupid. They should have them pass the language test of the country they play for.

Well some countries just abuse the rule. For example Chase Budinger has latvian roots and could play for our team, but he does not know a word in latvian (most likley).
We also had 2 others guys who played for our national team that had latvian roots, but grew up in states, since they families fleed soviet occupation in WW2.
But as it stands now, the rules to get citizenship and play for team are to ridiculous. Does get silly when you see guys like McCalebb and Rice play for balcan countries...