What I am amused by is all of the tough talk poted here in these comments. Americans: settle down. There’s a reason that USA didn’t win ’04 Olympics and ’06 Worlds: bad chemestry. These national teams never really layed a lot of games together but were expected to beat fundamentally sound South American and European teams. The USA took gold last year because they combines size, power, speed and finnesse with better training.

Both sides of this board,Americans and Euros: you are not basketball fans, you are big mouth blowhards. you are jingoistic pseudo-patroits. Every time an American team suits up with a another team outside US/Canada, it is nothing but good for the sport. Can’t wait for the FIBA World Clubs Championship to jump off.

P.S. GO LAKERS!

Are you kidding me? Why should the NBA be afraid of losing games in Europe, especially with the shitty b-ball you play over there? I have never seen such talentless and overrated hacks as the ones that come from Europe. Your international rules were plainly crafted to handicap U.S. players seeing as how our guys are so much better than your pathetic players. Adapt to international rules? Why don’t you try adapting to NBA rules and start trying to play basketball the way it was MEANT to be played? Or is it too hard for your pansies? Face it, when it comes to basketball – Europe SUCKS HARD. The U.S. has, does, and always will rule over you when it comes to b-ball. You can have your bragging rights when it comes to soccer though, seeing as how no one in the U.S. in their right mind would play that boring, womanly game anyway.

It doesn’t matter if the european teams win everytime or if the nba teams win everytime or wether any team win by a lot. It’s something entertaining and it’s because it’s something different. The same thing happens with football and the Intercontinental Cup that was the best european team against the best southamerican team, now they changed it into the best teams from all the continents that it seems more rightful for the winner to say that it’s the world champion, but this Live Tour it’s friendly matches to entertain the audience while showing NBA teams playing with totally different teams. It dissappoints me that they are going to end it.

Oh, and for those that say that american are not arrogant. The 2002 World Basketball Championship, everyone said to the USA team the “dream team”. What happened? they ended up 6th. 2004 Olympics, again they marked them as the “dream team”. What happened now? bronze medal. They are not the best players on the world, neither they have the best league teams or the best national team. Everyone think that they are so great just because of the NBA and the media: television, movies, etc. They have great teams but they are not gods that’s what i mean. Not just because they came from the USA they are the so called “dream team”. And a true fact, the USA teams want the world to adjust the way they play, if they can’t adjust to international rules then they should be the ones not playing against european teams.

Cite your source.

Accusing Americans of “arrogance” has become so typical among Europeans that to argue otherwise is considered abnormal. You obviously know nothing about the differences between the NBA and FIBA game. The issues affecting USA basketball’s international play have absolutely nothing to do with arrogant players playing for themselves and poo-pooing coaching instructions. Recent losses have more to do with the fundamental differences in how basketball is played and intrepreted in the NBA vis-a-vis FIBA. The NBA game emphasizes and promotes individual skill, usually to the detriment of team basketball. Isolation plays, limited or no zone defenses, clogged inside lanes, and “special” no-calls–like travelling and palming–which are common in the NBA no longer exist in FIBA, making it difficult for NBA players to adjust to international play. Even as highly skilled as Allen Iverson and Tim Duncan are, the shortcomings of the 2004 team serve as a prime example of what happens when you throw players together and expect them to simply *click* against teams that understand the FIBA system, play with better chemistry and are better organized defensively and offensively. These aren’t excuses, they’re legitimate reasons why the US has failed in recent years.

How do you even qualify an ignorant statement like this?