BallinEurope, the European Basketball news site

All signs indicate that it’s the end of an era, but it just doesn’t seem real. Yesterday, a patriarchal figure over one of Europe’s most prestigious and historically significant organizations officially stepped down from his high post as observers speculated about what millions of followers could expect next.

No, BallinEurope’s not talking about this guy, but rather that bombastic owner of Žalgiris Kaunas, Vladimir Romanov. Media (outside of Lithuania, that is) will surely be sad to see Romanov, a man who has given us so many ludricrous bizarre outright insane memorable moments in his nearly four-year tenure as The Boss.

BiE for one, will certainly be ever nostalgic for the unwarranted proclamations of genius; for the firings mid-championship series or anytime, really; for the medical recommendations; for the paranoid calling out of the blogosphere; for ordering player minutes like to-go items at the drive-thru; and surely much much more.

Just to reinforce that “le roi est mort,” the club issued a formal report late yesterday reaffirming Romanov’s resignation from board and chairman positions of Zalgiris.

Ran the message: Continue Reading…

Pianigiani: That’s one million…

Firstly comes the question of — believe it or not — economics. Beyond a handful of big deals given to players in the off-season, Pianigiani was given a contract of two years plus a third-year option. Showing the Italian the door right now would cost the Turkish team $4 million. While the contract does account for payment by installment, Fenerbahçe would still have to immediately pony up $1 million — and what European club has that kind of money lying around in 2013?

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This one goes out by request. After a few hours of research (and lots of time spent frustratingly chasing dead ends) BallinEurope comments on FIBA’s first big official move of 2013 – the seemingly inevitable rule changes coming to international basketball representing further acquiescence in the shadow of the NBA.

The story
So here’s what’s known. Back in July, a group of 13 from all around the basketball and business worlds produced a list of proposals under the auspices of the Euroleague’s Basketball Rules Summit.

The summit’s chief goal was to tweak the game to make “the competitions cleaner, fairer and more exciting,” and while most prescribed changes were cosmetic (e.g. jump-ball rules, timeout changes), one radical idea then put forth would make the uniform standard court size based on NBA specifications.

In late November, the Euroleague Commercial Assets Assembly (CAA) met on the subject of certain proposed rule changes with regard to, well, the bottom line of top-level European basketball clubs. While the CAA typically addresses and assesses issues connected with ticket sales, broadcast rights, investment, corporate social responsibility, etc., the commission took it upon itself to discuss two wide-sweeping transformations: the recommendations from the summit and FIBA’s proposed reshaping of international tournaments.

After this meeting, the CAA agreed to send onto FIBA the rule-change proposals, including: Continue Reading…

Apologies from BallinEurope for not weighing in on this … thing until this morning, but after rereading it for the nth time, BiE felt the rant building but wanted to avoid posting an overly emotional response. Perhaps a day and a good night’s rest would temper my viewpoint; maybe upon waking this morning, we’d all discover after logging in to FIBA.com that the Eurobasket manipulation had all been a smokescreen for the hiring of Mike D’Antoni. Or something.

Or does one…?

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On the evening before a meeting of domestic league officials, the Netherlands’ basketball federation announced that the country would not be fielding a men’s national team or a U20 squad in international competition for next summer and in 2014.

The reason? What else but money?

The NBB reported that a debt of €400,000 (over $510,000) has been run up by the club over the past two years; the austerity measures were further blamed on the lack of Netherlands’ clubs’ prestige internationally and the fact that no club could afford to play in pan-European competitions in 2012-13.

All women’s programs, men’s youth basketball and wheelchair teams will continue unimpeded.

Team Netherlands has not qualified for the men’s Eurobasket tournament since 1989.

Thanks to Gideon van der Hijden of Netherlands-based Basketball Plus for the tip!

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The Euroleague and its Basketball Institute concluded its “Basketball Rules Summit” yesterday and today has put out a press release detailing some of the recommendations for future EL and Eurocup play. Said media communique follows.

(Euroleague) – …The spirited two-day debate among 13 of the top coaches, players, referees, team and league executives, media, television and marketing experts reached a consensus on proposals to improve a range of game situations that respected the summit’s goal in making the competitions cleaner, fairer and more exciting.

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For a brief while, the collective imagination of Twitter’s European basketball region was captured by rumors of the CSKA Moscow budget for 2012-13. Naturally, it’s no news when the Big Red Machine spends large sums wheeling and dealing in the off-season, but the rumored figures this year are pretty damn mind-boggling.

CSKA has already been rumored to be in the hunt for many of the prospective names on the big market, most recently Aaron Jackson, who may or may not actually be leaving Gescrap Bilbao Basket after two seasons there. Then there’s Andrei Kirilenko, on a three-year contract with an NBA out clause, who has dropped enough teases about possibly staying with the team to keep folks interested and club accountants nervous.

In any case, Ervinas Spūdys of Lithuania-based Krepsinis.net yesterday tweeted that “According to VTB United League’s numbers, next year’s CSKA budget will be 44 mln. euros, Khimki’s – 18,5 mln. euros.”

Retorted Savaş Birdal of Euro-Step, “Open letter to CSKA Moscow: If you are going to buy the Euroleague title, at least pay the necessary taxes first.”

To put these numbers into perspective (sort of), one list of budgets for Euroleague clubs in 2011-12 follows.

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As has been widely reported, a big powwow in Istanbul is currently going on while the 2012 Euroleague Final Four plays out: The meeting of the minds (and money) features Brooklyn Nets owner Mikhail Prokhorov, team general manager Billy King and prospective free agent Deron Williams.

While Prokhorov checks out his former charge Andrei Kirilenko during the games – quite probably with the ultimate goal of signing up the AK-47 for the Nets – he and King apparently are attempting to sweet-talk D-Will into reupping with his 2011-12 team. Though Williams has pointedly noted his dissatisfaction with the team and his intention to bolt once the free-agency period has officially begun, at the beginning of this month, CBS Sports quoted a source as stating that he was “leaning toward re-signing with the Nets.”

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In this second piece of a two-part series, sportswriter/commentator Uygar Karaca again considers the EuroChallenge Championship Curse, with special reference to this year’s champions, Beşiktaş; unfortunately for the Eagles, Karaca feels a distressing amount of déjà vu…

In this article, I will try to answer the question as to whether Beşiktaş Milangaz fits into the framework of the “EuroChallenge Championship Curse.” Just to reminder for readers: A few days ago, I compiled a list of teams who won the FIBA EuroChallenge trophy and what happened to them thereafter. Many of these team’s fates were not very nice and unfortunately, one can fairly claim that Beşiktaş is walking a similar path.

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Speaking of German basketball, BallinEurope pushes forth a plug for Euro-Step.net’s piece of today entitled “The Rise of the Germans.” Writer Julios (hey, that’s what it says) takes a look at Bundesliga CEO Jan Pommer’s once seeming pipe dream of making the BBL the top league on The Continent by 2020.

Julios gives a generally positive assessment of the Pommer Masterplan, reporting that all systems appear to be going strong in noting that “the average attendance this season has reached an all-time high of 4293 and an average capacity of 5,139. That easily places the German league at second spot in Europe second only to the ACB (average attendance of 6,420 per game) [and] well over traditionally strong leagues” such as those in Italy, Greece, Russia and Turkey.”

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