Ball in Europe – European Basketball Blog

Now that NBA mock drafting is in full swing (despite the total lack of clarity regarding playoff positioning, not to mention seeing how the damn lottery ping-pong balls fall this year), BallinEurope’s man in the U.K., Sam Chadwick, will be taking a look at some of Europe’s prospective high draft picks. Today, it’s all about big man Donatas Motiejunas.

Vital stats
Position: Centre/Power Forward
Height: 7’0”/2.13m
Weight: 224 lbs/101 kg
Date of birth: 09/20/1990
Current Club: Benetton Treviso

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“Best of the (Basketball) Net” is one day late this week, but that extra 24 hours or so will surely make all the difference in terms of quality. For some most interesting recently-posted basketball-related stuff from the interweb, read on to check out excerpts from a classic of basketball literature, see highlights from a big ACB upset, discover Dirk Nowitzki’s secret weapon, and to witness the first-ever truly 21st-century dunks. Enjoy!

• Anybody who remembers the seminal book Heaven is a Playground will definitely want to check out this interview with Rick Telander conducted by the amazingly-named Bethlehem Shoals. For those of you not-in-the-know, be sure to check out the extended excerpts from the book which ran at Slam online in October 2008 and precipitated the book’s recent new edition out of University of Nebraska Press; and you can click here for the book’s official site.

Incidentally, the book was also morphed into a, um, not-so-great film starring D.B. Sweeney in the Telander role and featuring ballers Hakeem “The Dream” Olajuwon (no, really) and former NBAer/Hank Gathers teammate Bo Kimble.

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Noah's arc has yet to peak

As one of the popular highlights of the NBA season, everything about the annual All-Star Game is loaded with pomp, hype and (hopefully) fun. No exception was that moment many a basketball fan awaits with gusto and prepares to heartily attack in argument as the naming of the rosters for the teams that will be squaring off in a Harlem Globetrotters-looking exhibition game next month.

Without further ado, then, the presentation of those long-awaited all-star rosters! (We’re talking the Official BallinEurope European NBA All-Star Team; what’d you think was meant?)

The following is a roster based on performance in the US’ big league in 2009-10 to this point. An attempt at building a normal-seeming roster was made, though this team has a definite accent on the big man. Let the arguments begin!

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What would Phil read?

Another Sunday, another of BallinEurope’s “Best of the (Basketball) Net” column. Lots of interesting stuff hit the interwebs this week, with tons of material for you to read – and that increases by literal volumes should you take our first item to heart…

• Could this be the basketball-related post of all-time or just in this century? The always fun Free Darko this week not only ran Phil Jackson’s reading list for his Los Angeles Lakers (publicly released on Twitter by the Zen Master’s lady/Lakers Executive VP of Business Operations Jeannie Buss on Friday), but analyzed each choice in detail for its individual symbolism and greater message – gotta love the take on Ron Artest getting Sacred Hoops: Spiritual Lessons of a Hardwood Warrior by, um, Phil Jackson.

• In yet another recent effort to define Dirk Nowitzki’s role in NBA history, sportswriter R.S. De France drew up his quite extensive list of the “All-Time Best International Basketball Players in the NBA.” Is Dirk no. 1? Welllllllllllllll, let’s just say he’s up there.

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Happy 20,000th, Dirk! (image © ArtByGrant.com)

Ball in Europe wraps up the week with a slew of YouTube videos – just in case you haven’t seen enough basketball lately…

This edition of “Best of the (Basketball) Net” is all about the numbers. Numbers like 20,000, 3,000, 10-0 and 2011. But enough exposition: Videos await!

• You quite possibly may have heard that Dirk Nowitzki scored his 20,000th point in the NBA this week, becoming the 34th player to do so. Here’s the instant-history moment:

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Got time on this Sunday? Great to hear it! Ball in Europe has a nice handful of video clips and stories to guide your surfing with another edition of “Best of the (Basketball) Net.”

Buzzing on the interwebs this week in stories not involving a certain bunch of Washington Wizards were Euroleague, FIBA, FCB, and NBA play. We recap, you enjoy (we hope) … happy Sunday!

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“When it’s all said and done Dirk will end up being the greatest European basketball player to ever play in the NBA, if he isn’t already.” So ran the tangential line from within a story at Bleacher Report entitled “A New Decade: A New Future.”

Though this contention is taken for granted in the U.S., in this instance the mention of Nowitzki’s preeminence was a stopper. Perhaps it was the prospect of reading more on the really very awful New Jersey Nets or just the simple acknowledgement of a mostly utterly non-clutch player (in the NBA) as the league’s finest ever, but such a premise deserves further inspection.

To the straight-up statistics first – we’ll talk intangibles and relative career success a bit further on – shows one monster compilation of stats indeed. Nowitzki’s career highlights in the NBA include:

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Darko will be back...

Wrapping things up for the weekend here at BallinEurope means mostly one thing: a rundown of some of the best basketball stuff made available online this week. Some news, quotes and video for this week starts now.

Starting off with a well repeated, now-definitive story, then: Namely, the New York Knicks’ Darko Milicic will be returning to Europe for 2010-11: “It’s 100-percent certain. I have to be real and not lie. I’m not going to get it done in the NBA. I’m not going to get another opportunity and there’s nothing wrong with going back to Europe. I don’t want to create a bad atmosphere here, but it’s not working in the NBA.” (Any early bidders…?)

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Jasikevicius: Blood, sweat and tears for 10 years

While technically this decade doesn’t end until 2010, with millions of sports websites and blogs proclaiming December 31 the end of the 2000s, who is BallinEurope to be pedantic? (Especially when there’s a good excuse to make an all-time team roster.)

Therefore, in the spirit of a new era, BallinEurope seeks to comprise Europe’s All-Decade team for the years 2000-2009. We’ve got two slots free on an ideal 12-man roster, but the first ten spots might be filled by the likes of the following.

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Germany’s basketball fans got an unofficial boost yesterday, thanks to a column from ESPN’s Marc Stein which had Dirk Nowitzki declaring his career with Team Germany not yet over while speculating on a reunion with Chris Kaman in 2010.

The former twosome met in Saturday’s Los Angeles Clippers-Dallas Mavericks game, a matchup that was worthy of little attention outside the future implications for the German national team, particularly with the team seemingly in line for a “wild card” spot to be handed out for the 2010 FIBA World Championships.

Stein opines that Germany is in the mix for a FIBA wild card, along with Russia, Lithuania, and “Great Britain – home team for the 2012 Olympics and a fast-improving hoops nation led by Chicago’s Luol Deng” and that Mavericks owner Mark Cuban has promised that “discussion about Nowitzki returning to the national team would be reopened as long as he took ‘a year off.’”

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