What’s wrong with Americans in Europe?

Dario from basketbalcentral.it just sent me an email on Rawle Marshall, who plays for Cibona and also in the Euroleague.

Rawle got into a fight in a domestic league game against Split.

These fights of Americans have happened very often in recent weeks. I had to check immediately if Rawle is also from Arizona, as are his fight buddies Loren Woods and Joseph Blair, but thank god he is not: Rawle went to Oakland University, although he had a one-year contract with the Dallas Mavericks.

Here is the video evidence, thanks to Dario:

Basketball fight: Arizona WILDcat strikes in Russia

Ilya Kalyagin, our source from Russia, lives in Rostov. On Tuesday, Spartak St. Petersburg played Lokomotiv Rostov in the Russia Cup quarterfinal. Just to let you know who players are on these teams:

Spartak St. Petersburg:

• head coach Yevgeny Pashutin, former assistant coach of Ettore Messina at CSKA Moscow
• Zakhar Pashutin, Yevgeny’s brother and former CSKA player for Ettore Messina
• Joseph Blair - US player who played for Armani Jeans Milano and attended University of Arizona

Lokomotiv Rostov

• D.J. Collins, who will always be remembered as the “chicken and porn guy” with the funniest interviews
• Fred House, US guard, who won the ULEB Cup with Lietuvos Rytas in 2005

Seems to be a pretty good matchup, right?

Well, the game was anything but good. It seems as if the Arizona Wildcats players in Europe have one serious issue: punching other players on the court in the face. About two weeks ago, it was Loren Woods who swung his fist, now - Joseph Blair - and let me tell you I would not want to be the one receiving a straight fist from a guy like this. The guy who got hit now looks like this.

Sixteen — 16! — players were removed from the court and play resumed. First it was a 4-on-4, before ultimately becoming a 3-on-3 match.

Here is video footage of the fistfight. It looks like the two Russian players were arguing when the guy in white was pushed. It seems like he wanted to get back at the assailant, but, well, Blair delivered first.

Ilya also has footage from the 4on4 4on4 as well as the 3on3. 3on3 It turns out that Blair and the Russian guard Visnevski will be disqualified for at least 5 games.

US high school star playing in Europe?

We have already talked about the question whether being drafted is still worth it for Europeans. And we spoke, more in a joking way, about when European teams recruit American high school seniors for their own youth program. Well, this may now happen, as ESPN reports.

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