OT - Olympic Men's Basketball

He15man

Starter
I find this absolutely hilarious. The arrogance of today's NBA and NBA player is unsurpassed.... a bunch of self-absorbed, self-righteous megalomaniacs. Bring back players like Jordan, Barkley, Magic, and Bird and I'd start watching again; at least those guys didn't bitch about having to play during the regular season and view Team USA as an offseason distraction to their "recovery." These guys we have now are overpaid disgraces.
 

GMU79

All-American
⭐️ Donor ⭐️
GIVING DAY 2023
I find this absolutely hilarious. The arrogance of today's NBA and NBA player is unsurpassed.... a bunch of self-absorbed, self-righteous megalomaniacs. Bring back players like Jordan, Barkley, Magic, and Bird and I'd start watching again; at least those guys didn't bitch about having to play during the regular season and view Team USA as an offseason distraction to their "recovery." These guys we have now are overpaid disgraces.
Welcome to the thumbs down club, He15Man. Wear the honor proudly!
 

sleeperpick

Hall of Famer
⭐️ Donor ⭐️
I find this absolutely hilarious. The arrogance of today's NBA and NBA player is unsurpassed.... a bunch of self-absorbed, self-righteous megalomaniacs. Bring back players like Jordan, Barkley, Magic, and Bird and I'd start watching again; at least those guys didn't bitch about having to play during the regular season and view Team USA as an offseason distraction to their "recovery." These guys we have now are overpaid disgraces.
I hear a lot of this and do wish a ton of NBA players today would complain less and be less soft... but maybe if Bird did rest occasionally his back wouldn't have shortened his career by 5-7 years... just offering a bit of a differing opinion.
 

Petey Buckets

Starter
⭐️ Donor ⭐️
...at least those guys didn't bitch about having to play during the regular season and view Team USA as an offseason distraction to their "recovery." These guys we have now are overpaid disgraces.

1) The guys who are there aren't the ones thinking like this. This makes no sense. Jrue Holiday and Khris Middleton could still be stateside going apeshit celebrating their title, but they hopped on a 15-hour flight to Tokyo instead.

2) The compressed NBA schedule the last two seasons has been absolutely brutal, resulting in the rash of injuries that affected this year's playoffs. Not surprising that guys with a short window to make millions per year want to extend that window as long as possible.
 

jessej

All-Conference
⭐️ Donor ⭐️
GIVING DAY 2023
i'd be in favor of
1) dropping the NBA players
2) get a team composed of College players, maybe 1 or 2 G League players, a couple of guys who play pofessionally outside of the USA, and maybe 1 or 2 recently retired NBA players
 

Masonfan3

Starter
1) The guys who are there aren't the ones thinking like this. This makes no sense. Jrue Holiday and Khris Middleton could still be stateside going apeshit celebrating their title, but they hopped on a 15-hour flight to Tokyo instead.

2) The compressed NBA schedule the last two seasons has been absolutely brutal, resulting in the rash of injuries that affected this year's playoffs. Not surprising that guys with a short window to make millions per year want to extend that window as long as possible.

I agree with you on number 1 but don't buy number 2. The gold medal game is on August 7th and "training camp" for the NBA is almost two months later. That is plenty of time for some guys to get "right" before the season. If they were injured, I get it but there is no medical reason for Lebron and Steph to sit out. Having said that...the current roster has too much talent to lose to France. Hopefully it will be a wake up call for not only the players but for the coaching staff as well.
 
Hopefully it will be a wake up call for not only the players but for the coaching staff as well.

Losses to Nigeria and Australia a couple of weeks ago should have been the 'wake up calls..."

It really says something that J'Rue Holiday can immediately come in and be the USA's best player despite not having practiced with the team. It says that USA Basketball really hasn't been seriously practicing much, and that we still rely on individual skill more than system/strategy.

But the worst part of all of it is the complete dick Popovich taking zero responsibility for any of it and acting like people are somehow out-of-bounds to wonder about a team that hasn't lost in 17 years losing to second-tier world teams.
 

MasonSAE4

All-American
⭐️ Donor ⭐️
I find this absolutely hilarious. The arrogance of today's NBA and NBA player is unsurpassed.... a bunch of self-absorbed, self-righteous megalomaniacs. Bring back players like Jordan, Barkley, Magic, and Bird and I'd start watching again; at least those guys didn't bitch about having to play during the regular season and view Team USA as an offseason distraction to their "recovery." These guys we have now are overpaid disgraces.
Yeah I want guys with no egos! like….*checks notes*….Larry Bird?
 

phoenix-arizona

All-American
i'd be in favor of
1) dropping the NBA players
2) get a team composed of College players, maybe 1 or 2 G League players, a couple of guys who play pofessionally outside of the USA, and maybe 1 or 2 recently retired NBA players

Yes--Team USA has shown they can win gold medals with professionals. Let the team be composed of college players and developing G Leaguers regardless of outcome.

There is probably too much marketing money tied into it though to allow this to happen.
 

GMUSSTN

Starter
GIVING DAY 2023
Weird idea I just had that will never happen but would be interesting:

Move basketball to the winter olympics. It's a "winter" sport in most places and takes place 100% inside, so you can really play it whenever. Then in olympic years just do what the NHL does and skip the all star game and give people 3 weeks to go be in the olympics.

I have no other upsides, nor have I thought about this any further. But it certainly would be interesting. I always like how the NHL players take the olympics so seriously...I feel like as the NBA gets more international we could develop a similar feel instead of telling players they need to sacrifice a huge chunk of the offseason to go play.
 

He15man

Starter
1) The guys who are there aren't the ones thinking like this. This makes no sense. Jrue Holiday and Khris Middleton could still be stateside going apeshit celebrating their title, but they hopped on a 15-hour flight to Tokyo instead.

2) The compressed NBA schedule the last two seasons has been absolutely brutal, resulting in the rash of injuries that affected this year's playoffs. Not surprising that guys with a short window to make millions per year want to extend that window as long as possible.
I hear what you're saying, and i realize what i'm saying isn't a widely held belief, but i just personally can't watch or respect today's NBA at all. I don't even see how it's arguable that that today's players aren't nearly as competitive as the Jordans, Barkleys, Ewings, Olajuwons, etc. And before anyone jumps down my throat, what I mean by "competitive" is that these old timers wouldn't have DREAMED of playing on or creating super teams or "Big 3's." I'm sure players today are competitive in the sense that they want to win, but I don't see ANYTHING relatively close to how the superstars of the 80s and 90s were... the guys who literally lived and breathed competition and would rather die than give their opponent the satisfaction of JOINING THEM after getting beat. Are there exceptions in the NBA today? Obviously. But for the most part, all I hear from our superstars are how hard their schedule is, how unfair something is, how they shouldn't be expected to play most of the season's games, how All Star games are a big inconvenience, or how the honor of representing your country isn't worth your time (or, better yet, turn it into a political thing....). It's just pure insanity coming from guys that are making 20, 30, 40 MILLION per year! Anyone here can disagree with me all they like, but it'll be a cold day in hell when i feel sympathy for a guy that makes an annual salary capable of setting up 3 generations of their family.
 

He15man

Starter
Yeah I want guys with no egos! like….*checks notes*….Larry Bird?
Who said anything about egos? I couldn't care less about a guy's ego. Just don't complain about your life and how overworked you are when your contract is worth more than the GDP of most small countries -- and THEN go lose to freakin' France after acting all big and bad.
 
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