BigDirty

Actually the USA have changed soccer rules in their league. I don't know if all the rules are still active, but they did play with larger goals so there would be more scoring, they had/have some silly shootout when a match is a draw, I think they even had timeouts at one point. What are the basketball rules in Canada by the way? Do they play with international rules or with NBA rules?

Are you guys trying to be funny? The NBA & NCAA courts are 94x50 feet, the courts in the rest of the world are 92x49 feet, wow what a difference, totally keeps players from using their athleticism. The only other differences are the length (12 minute quarters - 10 minute quarters), the 3 point line (23'9 - 20'6), under FIBA rules you're allowed to touch the ball if it is above the cylinder and the traveling rules under FIBA rules are more like in the NCAA. And since every league in the world uses FIBA rules (except NBA & NCAA, but even they have different rules), surely the NBA should have to change the name of their game.

ALBA Berlin has signed ex-Hawk Dijon Thompson. Luke Schenscher has signed with german champion Brose Baskets Bamberg and Ed Nelson signed with Giessen 46ers. Right now it seems like there will be a tough fight for the crown between champion Bamberg and ALBA Berlin. ALBA: Goran Jeretin/?/Nicolai Simon Julius Jenkins/Johannes Herber Dijon Thompson/?/Philip Zwiener Goran Nikolic/Dragan Dojcin Patrick Femerling/(Ruben Boumtje-Boumtje?) Bamaberg: Steffen Hamann/Mark Dickel/Sajmen Hauer Desmond Greene/Robert Garrett Predrag Suput/? ?/Darren Fenn/Ivan Pavic Luke Schenscher/Chris Ensminger/Tim Ohlbrecht Bamberg lost two important starters (league MVP Casey Jacobsen and Vincent Yarbrough, they also didn't resign Sean Dockery, but he was disappointing anyway) so it shouldn't be easy for them to repeat, but they want to sign another good PF. ALBA has a new head coach, Luka Pavicevic) and is recontructing their team from an american style (last year they had 6 US players with William Avery, Sharrod Ford, Ruben Boumtje-Boumtje, Julius Jenkins, Koko Archibong and Chris Owens) to a traditional yugoslavian style.

Are those people like people that blamed the french for wrongly accusing a US rider for doping eventhough the french were to be proved absolutely right? The Duke Lacrosse was NOTHING like this case. In the Duke case you basically had a girl saying 'they raped me' and that was basically all the evidence. Here you have multiple people saying Vick was involved, you have Vick's house that was involved, you have dead dogs on Vick's property that were involved, etc., so there is actual evidence. But who knows maybe that evidence is all faked by the french who are jealous that they were never in the Conference finals.

It won't be that much harder for turkish players to develop, the rule is 3+2, that means they can have five foreigns and a maximum of three can be on the court at the same time. To give you an example from other european leagues, in Germany a team must have 2 german players in their game day roster, the other players can all be foreign and the german players don't even have to play, they just need to be on the bench. Most teams don't have a single german starter and there are more american players in the german league than there are german players. So compared to many other european league 3+2 is quite good for young players.

Braves choked big time tonight in the 9th, I hope they can still win, it's currently 4-4 in the top of th 13th with 1 out.

You're not making any sense AT ALL.

Poor Vick??? It's sad that he might have to go to prison??? What's wrong with you???

Srbija won!!! Jeremic and Macvan were definitely the match winners for Serbia today. Macvan is either really smart or really really lucky, he is always at the right place. The most talented US players during the tournament seemed to be Patrick Beverley, Stephen Curry (although he seems to be a bit arrogrant) and Deon Thompson. France won the bronze medal game against Brazil.

The finals are on right now and after 16 minutes Serbia leads 40-23 against the USA. Did the USA use all of their luck yesterday against France or can they turn around this one too?

Nah, the failure rate is much higher, you just forget them because you'll never hear their names again. I can think of so many vids I've seen from 8-14 year olds that were dominating and they never amounted to anything. Sometimes if I can remember their name I'll find out that soandso is now 25 and playing for some obscure lower league team.

I don't think he'll make it to the pros. In my experience these 12 year old wonder kids (in every sport) almost never turn into great pros. It's always those average-good kids that become pros, but the 8-14 years old wonderkids simply disappear.

I was looking over the stat leaders after the first 6 games and there is a 6'10 brazilian guy, Paulo Sergio (Paulao Prestes), who is averaging 22 pts (leader has 23.2 pts) and 14.8 reb (2nd best has 10) while shooting 58%, not bad, not bad. Other stats: ARG Diego Gerbaudo 5'11 PG 8.7 Pts, 4.7 Ast (Real Madrid) ARG Nicolas De Los Santos 6'0 SG 14.2 Pts, 53% FG (C.B. Granada) AUS Andrew Ogilvy 6'11 C 23.2 Pts, 10 Reb, 2.7 Blk, 75% FG (AIS) CAN Kai Williams 6'6 SF 15.8 Pts, 6.5 Reb, 60% FG (South Dakota State) CAN Devoe Joseph 6'3 SG 20.5 Pts, 5.7 Reb (Pickering HS) FRA Nicolas Batum 6'7 SF 11.2 Pts, 6.2 Reb, 4.3 Ast, 68% FG (Le Mans) FRA Alexis Ajinca 7'0 C 7.5 Pts, 5.3 Reb, 2.5 Blk, 59% FG (Pau-Orthez) FRA Edwin Jackson SG 17.2 Pts, 57% FG, 44% 3FG LTU Zygimantas Janavicious 6'4 PG 10 Pts, 3.5 Reb, 6 Ast, 64% FG (Alytus Alita) SRB Milan Macvan 6'9 PF 15.8 Pts, 4.2 Reb, 70% FG (Zeleznik) SRB Miroslav Raduljica 6'11 C 11 Pts, 6.2 Reb, 60% FG (Zeleznik) SRB Boban Marjanovic 7'3 C 9.8 Pts, 6.7 Reb, 1.7 Blk, 63% FG (Hemofarm) SPA Xavi Forcada 6'4 SG 17.7 Pts, 4.2 Reb, 59% FG (L'Hospitalet) SPA Victor Claver 6'9 PF 18 Pts, 8.2 Reb, 53% FG (Pamesa) USA Jonny Flynn 6'1 PG 10.8 Pts, 2.3 Ast, 57% FG, 42% 3FG (Niagara Falls HS) USA Stephen Curry 6'1 SG 10.3 Pts, 4 Reb, 2.8 Ast, 59% FG, 50% 3FG (Davidson) USA Patrick Beverley 6'1 PG 11.5 Pts, 4.8 Reb, 3.3 Ast, 65% FG (Arkansas) USA David Lighty 6'5 G/F 8.7 Pts, 71% FG, 50% 3FG (Ohio St.) USA Matt Bouldin 6'5 SG 4.8 Pts, 3.2 Reb (Gonzaga) USA Deon Thompson 6'8 F/C 9.7 Pts, 4.7 Reb, 51% FG (North Carolina) USA DeAndre Jordan 6'10 F/C 7.2 Pts, 3.2 Reb, 76% FG (Bellaire Episcopal HS)

The quarterfinals for tomorrow are: USA - Argentina 7:30 EST Brazil - Australia 9:45 EST Serbia - Turkey 12:00 EST France - Spain 14:30 EST (I hope I converted the times correctly) You can watch the games live at http://www.serbia2007.fiba.com/

I think if anybody has to earn his minutes, this person should be Speedy after that pitiful season he had. I would give the starter spot (and the most PG minutes) to Law. Otherwise Woody might just forget about him like he does often about our young/bench players, I can just imagine Woody taking Speedy out just to bring in Lue or AJ and wondering who this young guy on the bench is.

They could also send Yi to Europe which in my opinion would be far better concerning the Olympics, cause there is only one team that plays like team USA (and China will not beat theam anyway) but there are several teams that play a european style. So if China wants their national team to get better, they should send players to Europe first, it'll get them a better chance to win some games. Just look at teams like Slovenia who had several NBA players in the last years but they never really helped their national team win, while teams like Greece, Germany (1 NBA player) and Spain (1 NBA player at that time) were very successful. Also I don't think more chinese people would watch NBA if there was one more Chinese in the NBA, cause chinese basketball fans would already watch NBA cause a)it's the best league and b)Yao is already there (I think they already televise most if not all of the Rockets games, so kids already have more than enough access to get to watch NBA basketball and become interested in the sport). If Tim Ohlbrecht would be drafted and then go to the NBA I don't think there would be a single german basketball fan that would suddenly become interested in the NBA just because there are now more german players, it would also not affect the number of games shown here. And you have to remember Mengke Bateer and Wang Zhizhi, they both did not get significantly better because they played in the NBA and because they failed they kinda lowered China's basketball reputation, so if Yi, their biggest young star, fails too (and we all think that he has huge bust potential) it will actually hurt China's basketball. So all in all I'd say that in my opinion if China wants to grow as a basketball nation, they should send players to Europe first, it's safer and more logical (I mean you don't go from junior high straight to the NBA, no you go to high school and then to college and after that you go to the NBA), if they have success with this, then they can advance to the NBA, little steps is the key to longterm success. If China's primary goal is money (although they don't need it, cause ALL the european soccer teams want to establish themselves in China) then the NBA is the best way to go. But in both cases China certainly doesn't need the NBA.

Why does China need the NBA?

When the quarterfinals begin on 20th July FIBA offers a live video stream here: http://www.serbia2007.fiba.com/pages/eng/f.../5977/live.html Just watched the first half of France-Serbia, the game is very close and there is an interesting center duell, the skinny, fast, athletic Ajinca vs. the slow, tall, powerful Marjanovic. Both players are arguably the bests for their team today. Ajinca has made some nice dunks and even an alley-oop, Marjanovic often has trouble keeping up with Ajinca and he's easily faked, but when he's not fooled then he makes some nice blocks and always keeps his arms high in the air. On offense Marjanovic made some nice powermoves, they can't really stop him when he gets the ball downlow, unfortunately Serbia is not passing so much until now. Ajinca has 12 pts & 5 reb and Marjanovic has 10 pts & 8 reb. Nicholas Batum, France's star, has only taken one shot, at least that shot got in. The usual starting center for Serbia, Miroslav Raduljica, got injured after a few minutes. Later USA plays Brazil, don't know if I'll watch it. I think it's really strange that you US guys can't see the games on TV, you have like a gazillion TV channels but you can't watch Rocky Mountain Revenue, you can't watch FIBA U19 World Championship, can you at least watch FIFA U20 World Championship??? But seriously, I don't understand it, basketball is MUCH bigger in your country than it is in most other countries, but your're the ones who can't watch an international tournament including your own team. If you get international channels, here's the complete channel list that show the games: Quote: Eurosport 2 - France & French overseas Departments & Territories, Germany, Austria, United Kingdom, Ireland, Finland, Sweden, Norway, Iceland, Denmark, Holland, Belgium, Switzerland, Luxembourg, Russia, Poland, Romania, Belarus, Montenegro, Kazakhstan, Moldova, Czech Republic, Slovak Republic, Hungary, Slovenia, Bulgaria, Armenia, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Serbia, Croatia, Bosnia, Macedonia, Albania, Ukraine, Spain, Portugal, Italy, Turkey, Greece, Malta and Cyprus Eurosport Asia/Pacific - Australia, Indonesia, Myanmar, Philippines, Hong-Kong, Malaysia, Brunei, Fiji and Maldives RTS - Serbia LBC - Lebanon CCTV - China TYC Sports – Argentina ESPN Brasil, Sport TV, - Brazil Hi TV – Nigeria TVE Deportes – Spain

You can either subsribe to the Eurosport webplayer (5€ for a month or 40€ for a year, in Europe Eurosport 1 & 2 are free TV channels) or you can use one of those internet streaming devices, but I don't know if it is allowed to post about them here so I will not post the address here. Unfortunately I can't watch the two games today cause at the time they're shown on Eurosport 2, Eurosport 1 is showing soccer U19 European Championship games and soccer>>>>>>basketball.

Any of you guys following this tournament? I watched USA-Serbia this morning and it was a really good game (unfortunately the wrong team won). Because of the serbian school all of Serbia's players had awesome passing abilities even the 7 footers, so when USA switched to a zone Serbia picked it apart like it's nothing. On team USA I really liked Stephen Curry, the son of Dell Curry, he made some very nice shots and showed some leadership, if he doesn't get into the NBA he can become a star in Europe. On Serbia's team there wasn't a outstanding individual performance, it was all about the team, but there was one player that caught my eye, Boban Marjanovic. Marjanovic is 7'3 and from what I could get he's still raw and unexperienced, but his basketball iq and passing skills are awesome, especially for a guy his size. On defense he makes mistakes, but everytime he made a mistake he adjusted the very next play so he didn't make the same mistake twice. He has some post moves but still a lot to learn. He can't jump at all, but then again he's 7'3 with long arms. I don't know if he'll ever be a NBA prospect but he's perfect for the european teams, I want him in a ALBA uniform now! The next game was France-Libanon but I really didn't watch it. The commentator said that France is very strong and has at least 7 players with NBA potential, I guess it will be exciting when they play the USA. France has a 7'0 center and he's no doubt the skinniest player I've ever seen (Snoop Dogg like skinny). His name is Alexis Ajinca, he's supposed to be a very talented and funny guy (I guess he'll be drafted by Seattle to go the Petro, Sene way ). Here's a picture:

Rush scored those 20 points per game in the 2nd italian league, so it's not impressive, but to my knowledge he already signed a contract for a french euroleague team. Gipson played for Paderborn, they finished 11th out of 18 and therefore did not make the playoffs. He was the 15th best scorer and finished 10th in assists per game.

That's a mean move by Billy, if he wanted to keep the coaches then why did he allow them to go to the interviews? I'm sure Larry was happy to be closer to his family and now BK simply tells him "Nah sorry Larry I changed my mind.". Maybe he didn't think that they would actually get job offers.

Quote: Then, what happens when David Stern says no way Jose to Belkin? Then there'll be a TV game show where the main price is ownership over the Hawks, it'll be a cross between Survivor, The Apprentice, Flavor Of Love and Takeshi's Castle, it's probably the best thing that can happen to us.

Quote: i wonder if i can get this to work the same way during the regular season. Probably not, I'd guess that one would have to enter a login and password during the regular season (but it sure would be nice if it worked ).

Quote: Horford is the best player in the draft for at least the next couple of years Keep dreamin'.