Basketball World Cup?

Decent_Left

Decent_Left

Well-known member
Apparantly this has been going on for the last month or so and the USA didnt even get the Bronze.

Does anyone take an interest in this sport and is this big news?

Strikes me as odd
 
I half read an article about it.

The gist was that the USA don't send anywhere near their strongest team, no major NBA stars go. I'm sure it said USA finished 7th at the one before this one?
 
Thnks for that. Bit of a weird attitude from them as it is a proper title from what I read, but explains the results.
 
Decent_Left said:
Thnks for that. Bit of a weird attitude from them as it is a proper title from what I read, but explains the results.
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I wonder if the NBA don't want to send their star players in case they still lose and it takes a lot of gloss from their competition?

Anyway, aside from that one article, that I can't remember where it was, i haven't seen anything else about the basketball World Cup. So I think it's fair to say it hasn't caught on over here.
 
I think you are right. I dont pay much attention to US specific sports but recall some issue they had when a US baseball team got beat by Japan or someone you wouldn't imagine.

Its like it hurts the brand rather than its a sporting issue.
 
Yeah I watch it.

USA national basketball team is a place for promising kids to show their skills, outside of the Olympics. Even then a lot of the best don’t go.

This is bang in the middle of the NBA off-season, so they’re all in Cancun / Vegas.

The team was probably an under-22’s level, and even then not the absolute elite of that age group. You’d still expect them to beat everyone in sight but Germany and Canada have a team of NBA players too, and many of the league’s current superstars are from Eastern Europe - Serbia (Nicola Jokic), Slovenia (Luka Doncic) - who love playing internationals, so the standard of international basketball has definitely raised.

It will be different for the Olympics in France next year. Just today actually LeBron James announced that he’ll be playing Paris 2024 and is doing a Blues Brothers-style recruitment drive of all the players who’ve defined his career, and they’re all up for it, so they’ll be an absolute Harlem Globetrotters.
 
jonny_greenings_sock said:
Yeah I watch it.

USA national basketball team is a place for promising kids to show their skills, outside of the Olympics. Even then a lot of the best don’t go.

This is bang in the middle of the NBA off-season, so they’re all in Cancun / Vegas.

The team was probably an under-22’s level, and even then not the absolute elite of that age group. You’d still expect them to beat everyone in sight but Germany and Canada have a team of NBA players too, and many of the league’s current superstars are from Eastern Europe - Serbia (Nicola Jokic), Slovenia (Luka Doncic) - who love playing internationals, so the standard of international basketball has definitely raised.

It will be different for the Olympics in France next year. Just today actually LeBron James announced that he’ll be playing Paris 2024 and is doing a Blues Brothers-style recruitment drive of all the players who’ve defined his career, and they’re all up for it, so they’ll be an absolute Harlem Globetrotters.
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Thank you. Have had a mooch on the FIBA site and the US squad was all players from the NBA but not what you would call celeb level.

A bit disrespectful towards the tournament tbh.

Got my interest now and will pay a bit more attention at the Olympics to see if anyone can run the US all stars close.

Gone down a rabbit hole now and looked up baseball world champions and turns out it's a tournement called the World Classic amd the MLB players do get picked for the US. Japan still won though

GB had a team in the finals - who knew?
 
I didn't follow it but read reports of the baseball world cup many years ago and USA didn't get anywhere then either, which I found surprising until I moved over there and realised where their best players came from.
 
Decent_Left said:
Thank you. Have had a mooch on the FIBA site and the US squad was all players from the NBA but not what you would call celeb level.

A bit disrespectful towards the tournament tbh.

Got my interest now and will pay a bit more attention at the Olympics to see if anyone can run the US all stars close.

Gone down a rabbit hole now and looked up baseball world champions and turns out it's a tournement called the World Classic amd the MLB players do get picked for the US. Japan still won though

GB had a team in the finals - who knew?
Click to expand...
That guy Anthony Edwards will be a star of the future but it’s only his second season in the league and he’s not a top 20 player yet. Playing for USA is seen as a development thing.

The US allstar Olympic team will be a great watch! It’s a very system-focused sport. There’s not many Real Madrids. Basically if you get a top player, you fill out the rest of the team to counter their deficiencies and complement them - vast majority of the top players don’t play together.

So when they do, it’s Harlem Globetrotters / NBA allstar game standard where nobody defends.

I think also that when your domestic trophy is called the World Championship, you’re not that bothered about being actual world champions.
 
Is there an insurance thing here too? Can't imagine an injured returning superstar would go down well with the powers that be.
 
It'll be about money. The top players get $50m per year in the NBA. They aren't risking injury for a competition they see as beneath them.
 
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