You want to give her a Valentine’s Day gift she’ll always remember? Here’s an idea: Spring for the entire grandstand and stadium offices of the Bundesliga Basketball League’s now-defunct Köln 99ers. Forget the dining-room set: These leftovers from Cologne’s hoops team include 3,100 seats and a bonus platform tower (“for technology and media,” we’re told). Bidding starts at just €150,000 on eBay.
Feb
0
Own a piece of German basketball history for just €150,000
Jan
0
Expert: Nowitzki’s 20,000 NBA points actually an inflated figure
Dirk Nowitzki may have to return that 20,000-NBA point marker he earned a couple of weeks ago if current European/American exchange basket rates are factored in.
Apparently, calculations by German basket economist Dr. Benedikt Acton have shown that a US basket is only worth 1.126 points on The Continent, thereby making Nowitzki’s 20,000 NBA points worth approximately 8,880 European points. Speaking to American newspaper The Onion, Dr. Acton stated that “nobody could have predicted the soaring inflation that followed Kobe Bryant’s 81-point game in 2006.”
The good news for Nowitzki, though, is that his 1,200-plus points scored in international play has dropped no value on the international basket market.
Jan
1
Coming soon to America: The KKKBA
Lewis: looking for "a better direction"
Though not related to the European game, quite the disturbing basketball story about a rather insidious idea for a new basketball league has come to greater light this past couple of days.
Ever imagine what the Ku Klux Klan Basketball Association might look like? Probably something akin to the proposed All-American Basketball Alliance, which is scheduled to begin play in June with “Only players that are natural-born United States citizens with both parents of Caucasian race … eligible to play in the league.”
Jan
0
On salaries in French basketball, 2009-10
Running over at the French-language website I Love Basket is a brief on salaries in Pro A and Pro B basketball. Some figures were recently released by the French players association with regard to average monthly salaries, with the key figures below.
(“FIBA players” are defined as those from European nations defined under the Bosman ruling, whereas the “Cotonou nations” are those of the African, Caribbean and Pacific Group of States excepting Cuba.) Combien gagnent-ils? Read on!
Dec
1
Strike! (Maybe.)
Perhaps not such a merry Christmas for Greece, then: Due to continuing conflict between ESAKE and the Greek players union (PSAK), play in the country’s top league may be stopped as of January 1.
Issues in play in the dispute include salary concerns, support for amateur ball, television rights and limits on non-European players.
Talk Basket lays down some heavy verbiage which seems to indicate that local players are the ones on the wrong end of exploitation:
Dec
0
Happy Treaty of Lisbon Day! (Now how does this affect basketball?)
December 1, 2009, will go down in history as the day the Treaty of Lisbon was put into full effect, thus “complet[ing] the process started by the Treaty of Amsterdam [1997] and by the Treaty of Nice [2001] with a view to enhancing the efficiency and democratic legitimacy of the Union and to improving the coherence of its action.” Indeed, this document can even be said to complete a 52-year-old plan first formulated with the European Economic Community established in Rome in 1957.
The implications and results of the Treaty of Lisbon are certain to be far-reaching, even reaching like Moses Malone into the world of European and international basketball. Ball in Europe takes a look at past, present and future in European Union sports regulation and legislation.
Nov
2
Help! Reader needs tickets to AJ Milano game!
BallinEurope yesterday received the following email and today we’re appealing to fellow readers for help:
Dear Os,
I really enjoy your website and read it every day from Israel.
I will be in Milan this coming week and I have been trying to get tickets for a League game AJ Milano on Sunday December 6. It is being played at the Palalido. I was wondering if you know how I can obtain tickets or perhaps one of your readers or if you could direct me to a supporter site.
I have only found what is on the AJ Milano website but it seems the tickets are not yet available and I don’t understand Italian.
Thanks for your help!
Josh
After more than an hour of surfing and checking bookmarks, i could do little better than Josh in his quest for tickets. He is correct in that, while lots of tickets are being offered at Italian outlets and by the team itself (working in conjunction with an outlet called BookingShow.com), tickets for this particular game are proving elusive.
One decent website for international sports tickets is SportsEvents365.com; however, at present, this one in basketball terms seems to be limited to hawking Euroleague tickets. Another decent place is TicketsFC.com, but again, it’s mostly about football over there.
And so, Ball in Europe now appeals to the fans, especially those in Italy. Any ideas on how Josh might score a couple of tickets to the AJ Milano-Martos Napoli game? You would have our undying gratitude, to be sure…
Nov
7
Euroleague attendance figures mostly dismal through four weeks
The numbers are in and if one thing can be said about Euroleague 2009-10 this early on, it’s that this association is hardly free of the specter of economic woes. After Partizan and Alba Berlin set attendance records in 2008-09, this season has heretofore seen a most remarkable downturn in paying fandom with Lottomatica Roma and possibly Efes Pilsen appearing to be the only teams with a chance to record decent growth for the season.
Attendance rates for week four games were reported as the following, though perhaps slight adjustment is needed in some cases with regard to actual *people showing up at the arena* (more on this in a moment).
Oct
4
Stern to become involved in Olympiacos controversy?
What does NBA commissioner David Stern have to do with Greek basketball, an Ohio court, the U.S. House of Representatives and Michael Jackson? Everything, if player agents Tom McLaughlin and Gary Ebert and Rep. Peter King (R.-N.Y.) have anything to say about it.
As noted here, Olympiacos allegedly owes McLaughin and former Reds player Chris Morris some $1.5 million in total when the latter was unceremoniously released from the team back in 1999.
Yesterday, the plot, which has involved warrants for property seizure, alleged death threats and, in the opinion of folks on this side of the Atlantic, racism and skewed journalism, thickened when King went straight to the top on behalf of Morris and all other U.S. players in Europe – no, not to Barack Obama, silly; to Commissioner Stern, of course.
The Sports Illustrated website described King’s letter to Stern as “essentially suggest[ing] that the NBA is culpable through its association with Olympiakos in the recent exhibition games.”
Oct
7
Olympiacos to take on Cleveland Cavaliers, US creditors tonight
Tonight will see the Cleveland Cavaliers play host to Olympiacos in Ohio and while the game will surely bring in the paying audience – if only to see the monster Shaq-King James tandem – the Greek side could well be leaving America $400,000 lighter.
According to the Cleveland Plain-Dealer, U.S. District Court judge Christopher A. Boyko gave the official OK for USA-based creditors to attempt to collect some $400,000 outstanding due to player agent Tom McLaughlin. It seems that Olympiacos cut former New Jersey Net/Utah Jazz player Chris Morris in 2001, still owing him $1.3 million in pay and McLaughlin another $400,000 atop that.
However, though Judge Boyko has in theory paved the way for McLaughlin to collect his money, there has been no word on whether an Olympiacos club representative in fact appeared in Boyko’s court on Friday, which the judge had ordered “before he [would] rule whether McLaughlin can proceed with the asset seizure.”