Mirotic: "not so attracted to NBA"
With the apex of his 2010-11 reached just this weekend in an eked-out victory over Power Electronics Valencia in the Euroleague playoffs – 11 points, including his team’s last five and the game-winner – Mirotic is causing some speculation as to playing for Team Spain in Eurobasket 2011 and getting drafted into the NBA.
From FIBA first comes some gushiness from Real Madrid captain/Team Spain member Felipe Reyes: “‘We are playing important games that are going down to the wire and players like Mirotic are crucial in those minutes…
“A player that can’t stay out of the headlines in Madrid is Mirotic, an all-tournament team selection at last year’s U20 European Championship while representing Spain.
“The forward excelled in the Top 16 when given a chance to be a big contributor by Messina and on Tuesday night against Power Electronics Valencia in Game 1 of their Euroleague Quarter-Final tie, he scored seven of his 11 points in the fourth quarter.
“His biggest baskets came when nailing a jump shot to give Madrid a 66-65 lead and the next trip down the floor, Mirotic buried a three-pointer from the left corner.
“The performances are giving him a chance to make Spain’s EuroBasket squad at the tender age of 20.”
And the hype has extended to Mirotic’s possible draft selection in 2011 as well: “Born in Montenegro but a naturalized Spaniard that could make the national team this summer and play at the EuroBasket, Mirotic could find himself in the NBA one day.
“‘The likelihood is that I will enter the next draft, although I want to remain here as long as possible,’ he said.
“‘I like the NBA, but perhaps I’m not attracted to it as much as other youngsters.’
“Mirotic averaged 15.3 points and 6.8 rebounds per game last summer for Spain at the U20 European Championship, leading the country to a bronze medal.”
Mirotic’s Real Madrid takes on Power Electronics Valencia in game two of their Euroleague playoff series at 8.45pm CET (3.45 EST) tonight.
Tags: 2010 FIBA U20 European Championship Men, 2010 Nike Hoop Summit, 2011 NBA Draft, ACB, Ettore Messina, EuroBasket 2011, Euroleague, Euroleague playoffs, Felipe Reyes, FIBA, FIBA U20 European Championship Men, NBA, Nike Hoop Summit, Nikola Mirotic, Power Electronics Valencia, Real Madrid, Team Spain, YouTube
Seems incomprehensible that he wasn’t playing more earlier in the season for Real, if you watch them a lot, he really is the ‘X factor’ that they often lack when they’re not overwhelming inferior domestic opponents. The whole team appears to have a collective unwillingness to take the big shot in close games (well, Clay Tucker doesn’t, but that’s often a bad thing!), but Mirotic has ice in his veins.
Miro or Ibaka for the naturalised slot in the Spanish NT?! Nice problem to have…..
As Messina himself explained earlier this season “Nikola unexpectedly exploded in my hand”..
He can score… wow.. he can score so much… terrific shooter…
awesome player. He only needs to get more muscle to fight in defense with strong PF´s, but offensively he is terrific. Very intuitive, and the new associate for Priggioni in the pick and roll (after Scola and Splitter he finds a new friend). Still can´t understand why he is so deep in the mock draft
He’s already getting ridiculously overrated now that US hype machine is on him. Nonetheless, he is 20 times a better player than Rubio is.
Everybody seems to be putting down Rubio. He is the starting point guard on the defending Euroleague champions so he can’t be that bad.
Gabe: when that team is ripe with a horrible playing style and bertomeuball to fit that style (NBA level of contact allowed in the final), no surprise a bieberesque PG can start for them
also, I will lose what little respect for the spanish NT I have if they sink to the level of allowing nationalised players in… bad enough that several years ago their euroleague youth teams were filled with yugoslavs and africans (luckily, not so much a case now)
Well that team with the horrible style are the defending champs. I think Rubio will do better in the NBA because of the style of play there.
And I assume you are talking about Ibaka. I think that is a travesty as well. He should play for the Congo, they have a team. I mean he lived in Spain for only two years! What’s next? The British nationalizing Lebron because he had a stopover in Heathrow Airport? Have some respect for your countrymen Spain!
Rubio sucks. What a shock that Gabe the super NBA fan of this site (and I remember him from the FIBA site also) is already defending him. Yeah, because he will be going to the NBA and all the lies have to be kept up how he was such a great Euroleague player just like all the bull shit about Childress. Lol these NBA fans crack me up. They really do.
Rubio is hot garbage. I hope he goes to the NBA ASAP so Euroleague fans don’t have to watch him suck so bad anymore. Any such POS player as Rubio belongs in the sports entertainment NBA and not in the great sportive Euroleague.
Let him go throw silly passes in the no defense NBA and sell tickets for the joke team in Minnesota. That’s where he belongs. He does not belong in the serious competition of the Euroleague. He is way too big of a pansy and prima donna for Euroleague basketball. Plus, he can’t hit the broad side of a barn with his jump shot. In the NBA you don’t even have to be able to shoot to be a good player as long as the refs give you free trips to the free throw line. Hell point guards like Chris Paul, Derrick Rose, Chauncey Billups are barely even average players in FIBA competitions, but in the zero defense NBA and with the no -hand check rule and the refs giving free trips to the foul line – they suddenly become “stars”.
Since Rubio is one of Stern’s new marketing golden boys for the Latin market that means that Rubio can just pile into defenders, yell, flail his arms out and get 10 trips to the free throw line in the NBA and he will be a “superstar”. Even though he can’t shoot and can’t score even a contested layup against Euroleague defense.
NBA is a freaking joke with its corrupt refs, rigged games, mafia commish, racist black supremacist announcers, racist “expert analysts” and racist fans, ridiculous amount of time outs, stupid “NBA cares” crap, ridiculous marketing schemes to inner city thugs, no-hand check rule, no true zone defense, 3 second defense lane violation, PED juiced up “elite athletes”, moron racist coaches and general managers, and on and on – and so is Rubio. Both are over-hyped, overrated, media sensation nonsense pansy entertainment shows with zero substance and zero true sportive competition. Rubio is tailor-made for the NBA just like all the other soft pansies. He has no business in a real man’s league like the Euroleague.
He can go throw some “sick dimes” and make ESPN Sportscenter Top 10 and make some gay “NBA cares” commercials where he plants some tree somewhere. He will just be another fake POS poser that the NBA covets so very much for its mafia driven sports entertainment show and for its soap opera crap.
Good god…………how the freaking hell does the NBA even have any fans? Oh well, I guess it won’t exist much longer, seeing how it lost between $350-$400 million each of the last 2 seasons. It’s a miracle that such a pathetic sports league even still exists at all.
Yeah Rubio sucks.
2× led the Spanish ACB League in steals: (2007, 2009)
Won the Spanish ACB League Rising Star Award: (2007)
3× FIBA European Young Player of the Year: (2007, 2008, 2009)
2× Spanish ACB League’s Best Point Guard: (2008, 2010)
2× All-Spanish ACB League Team: (2008, 2010)
Mr. Europa European Player of the Year: (2008)
Spanish ACB League Defensive Player of the Year: (2009)
Catalan Cup Tournament MVP: (2009)
Euroleague Rising Star: (2010)
Won the Spanish ACB League Top 5 Trophy: Most Spectacular Player of the Year (2010)
And Billups, Paul and Rose are average players in FIBA? Well they all have won gold medals in FIBA competitions. How many “real men” in Euroleague can claim that?
Michael is just another delusional fan of a second tier league that is so insecure it is a joke. It’s funny if Euroleague is better than the NBA when the players meet the NBA players destroy and embarrass their Euroleague competition.
Team USA with NBA players have gone undefeated and won gold medals in the last two FIBA competitions, destroying and embarrassing NT with Euroleague players.
When in competition against each other Euroleague teams are 7-37 against NBA teams since 2003.
So yes Euroleague is for real men but real European men and as Americans know when we see how soft European players are when they come to the NBA European men are…
From this very website:
Balsas: You had to play against the most powerful centers in the world. How do you compare the European game to and the NBA’s?
Sabonis: The NBA game was more physical. While in Europe they now play basketball a lot harder, I think it’s still not like the NBA. The American style of play is just different. It’s a more individual game. Also, the value of individual matches is different. You can’t say the regular-season games are not important, but besides the playoffs, [you just] play again tomorrow and move forward.
So Sabonis says that while in Europe they play basketball a lot harder, I think it’s still not like the NBA.
So who’s word should we take, same faggot internet troll like Michael or the great Avrydas Sabonis?
Sabonis played in the Euroleague when it was weak. This has been explained to you here before with Parker and you still argue about this crap. I believe it is obvious that you are just a dick who likes to talk his USA inferiority complex bull shit here to Europeans.
Get a damn life.
The Euroleague was about 1/3 as good when Sabonis played it. A team with a $5 million budget could win the league then and be an elite team and now such teams would not even make the playoffs.
Gabe you are a douche bag and you are really truly a POS. I have no respect for people like you. You have consistently proven that you are only here to antagonize and harass Europeans with your endless trolling and insults.
I am asking you now to stop this or it is time to start making complaints about you.
That is why I quoted Sabonis saying while “in Europe NOW they play basketball a lot harder, I think it’s still not like the NBA” although I left out the “now”, oops. So it’s his observation of Euroleague now and the NBA. Again who’s word am my going to take? Sabonis, one of the best European players ever, or a bunch of internet trolls?
Rubio sucks PERIOD. One of the WORST point guards in Euroleague. Gabe once again proves he is the biggest troll to ever post here.
Yeah a bunch of nonsense awards listed on Wikipedia is the extent of basketball knowledge this Gabe guy brings. Seriously man lay off the crack pipe. Rubio is a joke player. He’s easily the worst player on his team and he is a huge liability whenever he is in the game. The guy flat out sucks.
This Gabe guy is such a gigantic troll. Have non idea how this guy is not banned from here. We actually have a guy that rolls this website based solely on what he reads at Wikipedia without ever in his entire life having seen a game in Europe. To me that is clearly ban worthy.
Even more so that he clearly has no freaking clue what the hell any of that crap he copy and pasted from Wikipedia even means……
2× led the Spanish ACB League in steals: (2007, 2009)
Won the Spanish ACB League Rising Star Award: (2007)
3× FIBA European Young Player of the Year: (2007, 2008, 2009)
2× Spanish ACB League’s Best Point Guard: (2008, 2010)
2× All-Spanish ACB League Team: (2008, 2010)
Mr. Europa European Player of the Year: (2008)
Spanish ACB League Defensive Player of the Year: (2009)
Catalan Cup Tournament MVP: (2009)
Euroleague Rising Star: (2010)
Won the Spanish ACB League Top 5 Trophy: Most Spectacular Player of the Year (2010)
Yeah WOW I am blown away. OMG. Why don’t you go list some college and D-League awards from some crap American player and convince us he is the best player in the NBA because that is how freaking ridiculous your posts are.
Really, honestly ban this prick.
College and D-League crap? I know enough to know that the ACB is one of the best leagues, if not the best (with the current Euroleague defending champions and half of the teams playing in the Euroleague quarter finals) in Europe. Rubio is such a liability that he starts for the defending champions, he also won a silver medal in FIBA play. Could Teodosic claim that?
Why is Gabe not banned from here? This is a serious question. This guy is now trolling by claiming Rubio is one of the best in Europe. It’s getting out of hand.
He is harassing everyone with his trolling. He’s ruining the site and as far as I am concerned I won’t be reading or commenting here anymore because of him.
The truth hurts doesn’t it Zoran. You can’t argue with facts. And I never claimed that Rubio is one of the best in Europe, just that he doesn’t suck in Europe, which his awards back up. I see that not many Spanish fans are on this site. They might have something to say about combaring the ACB to D-league or saying that Rubio sucks! Yes, he may be overhyped but he doesn’t “suck”.
Gabe and all of you, just stop feeding the troll. The troll himself is Zoran, unless he is just out of his mind. I will be happy if he doesn´t read or comment anything else, such a relief.
The way he reasons, writes and argues is just hilarious if not disturbing and has nothing to do with basketball, but with personal issues and the will to cause stir and controversy.
His blind hate for Rubio, NBA is … well, he can´t be for real or he is just mental.
Rubio sucks migala. Sorry, but anyone saying otherwise has not watched Euroleague in the last 2 years.
I am not saying otherwise, I am not a Rubio fan, I am just questioning the mental state of that person called Zoran.
I entered this topic trying to read about Mirotic… Am I in the wrong place..?
[...] at BiE, what started as a simple post about rising ACB star Nikola Mirotic rapidly became a barrage of accusations of trollhood as the Is-Ricky-good-enough-for-the-NBA debate [...]
this
Nikola Mirotic is indeed one of those stars that have shone during the Top 16 round. He also played a crucial role in the playoffs vs Valencia, wherein he converted crucial shots to help his team win. In fact, he expected to take on a bigger role now that Real Madrid has made it to the final four!
[...] is especially notable along with his clutch play in a couple of games for Real Madrid in 2011. Mirotic says that he’s not so interested in playing NBA ball, but if he’s a top 15 pick, how would he [...]