Already it begins: The bitching about USA Basketball

Armchair,

I honestly don't know if our 12 best guys could beat Argentina by 45. I'd like to hope that they could, but I don't know.

Should they beat Argentina by 20? Absolutely.

 

I'm glad all of the hubris and muscle-flexing in this thread synthesized to this point.

The bottom line is we don't respect our opponents and that does create a lackadasical ethos that makes it difficult to suceeed via either method being advanced in this thread.

You can't "build through the tournament" -- which is what I think Sheridan's point is -- if you're taking quarters off. But you can't dominate a tournament if you don't respect every opponent.

 

Starman nailed it a couple of posts ago. They don't have to beat them by 45 but they damn well should be expected to play like they want to beat them by 45.

 

Play like that? Yes.

Think like that? No.

The Dream Team played like that.

The 2004 team thought like that.

 

If you don't think that way you won't play that way.

 

But if you think that way, you damn well better play that way.

 

Sheridan's reply on his blog:

Quite a few e-mailers also predicted the U.S. team will trounce everyone in the World Championship, to which I'll steal a line from Gregg Popovich and ask: Have you people been living in a phone booth for the past six years?

As Coach K told the team, if these games were being played under NBA rules with NBA refs in NBA arenas, the United States would wax everybody. But that's not the case here, and the challenge will be to beat these other teams at their game. And as anybody who has spent any time around international basketball knows, it's not the same game. The rules are different, the court is different, even the ball is different (it's slightly smaller than an NBA ball).

Here's a little international basketball quiz, and don't be ashamed if you get the answer wrong. So far during this training camp, I've asked the question of Joe Johnson, Bruce Bowen, Dwight Howard and Gilbert Arenas, and they all answered incorrectly. The question is: How do you call a timeout in an international basketball game? The answer is below.

Bowen, by the way, was taken aback by comments made by Spurs teammate Manu Ginobili of Argentina, which won gold at the 2004 Olympics. "He said they're basically going to be able to do whatever the want to do," Bowen said. "That was surprising to me, but if that's how they feel, they also better know that it isn't easy to defend championships, because when you're on the top, everyone goes after you."

Bowen likely will get the assignment of defending Ginobili if the Americans face Argentina, but Bowen said there's a misperception that he knows all of Ginobili's tendencies inside and out from defending him in practice every day. In reality, Bowen hasn't defended Ginobili during the Spurs' practices since 2004-05. Last season, they were almost always on the same squad during practice, Bowen said.

A few other notes:

• Carmelo Anthony declined to guarantee a gold medal as he did two years ago prior to the Olympics, a comment that circulated quickly around the world and was taken as a sign of disrespect by players from other countries.

• Chris Bosh became the first player to snatch a ball off the rim during a scrimmage. Under international rules, players can grab the ball while it is still in the cylinder -- a play that would be called goaltending under NBA rules.

• Elton Brand on the mind-set of the typical American fan when it comes to understanding how competitive international basketball has become: "They don't get it."

• Dwyane Wade on seeking redemption for the bronze-medal performance in Athens: "Coach K doesn't want us to redeem ourselves, but the guys that were there have that inside us."


Quiz answer: If you are a player, you cannot call a timeout in international basketball. Only a coach can.

 

One thing is, several of the international rules differences, in fact, should play right into the hands of a full-throttle running game:

1) as Sheridan mentioned, the fact that balls rolling on the rim are fair game -- unless the rule has just recently been changed -- if a ball is hanging on the rim, just as a defensive player can jump up and pick it off, an offensive player can jump up and tomahawk it in.

2) Probably the other big difference is the no-stoppage-of-play rule on backcourt turnovers. The ref doesn't have to handle the ball on a throw-in, you just grab it, take one step out of bounds, and hit a teammate with a touchdown pass heading to the other end. I suspect after Chris Paul, Wade, and LeBron get a handle on that, it will be fire-drill city.

As long as Chris Webber isn't on the team, when and whether players can call time out isn't likely to be a problem.