Minnesota Timberwolves 146
Arvydas Sabonis: A career retrospective, via YouTube
BallinEurope sends out huge, 7’3” congratulations this morning to all-time great Arvydas Sabonis, finally inducted into the Professional Basketball Hall of Fame alongside luminaries such as Chris Mullin, Dennis Rodman (whoa, that’s still weird), Artis Gilmore, Tex Winter, “Goose” Tatum, Tom “Satch” Sanders, Tara Van Derveer, Herb Magee, and Teresa Edwards. A tribute in the […]
Monday videos: Barcelona beaten, Cook cookin', remembering Moses and more
Welcome to the week, BallinEurope readers. We’ll get Monday started with a few video clips, stories, links, and some apocalyptic thinking about FC Barcelona. • Now here’s some motivation for Ricky Rubio to, you know, give that Minnesota Timberwolves thing a try: The decent possibility that Barcelona will not recapture the ACB championship title and, […]
Ricky Rubio: An object of faith
Of all the European players who have come down the NBA Draft pike, none – no, not even Darko – has been as polarizing as one Ricard “Ricky” Rubio Vives. And why such derision on both sides of the Ricky Rubio question? Since when has anyone outside the greater Minneapolis-St. Paul area cared so damn […]
Iverson gets surgery Tuesday; wants to play “several more years”; could head to Cleveland (yeah, surrrrrrrrrrrrrrre)
Nearly a month after his last game with Beşiktaş Cola Turka, BallinEurope still misses Allen Iverson. A.I. was just coming into form with the Turkish club when a rumor-enflaming leg injury took him out of action and back to America for treatment. Surgery will be performed on Tuesday to remove an “undetermined growth in his […]
The Eurocentric 2010-11 NBA Preview (or How the Hoops World revolves around Europe)
With the 2010-11 NBA season tipping off tonight, BallinEurope marks the occasion in the best way possible: By overrating the league’s Continental players and making a few offhand Fearless Predictions™ in the guise of a preview column. Brief notes and snarky remarks on all 25 NBA teams follow. (Yes, BiE said “all 25.” Since the […]
Frank answers to four burning Euroleague questions
He’s back! Emerging out of hiding (or perhaps digging himself out of work with youth squads plus Italian-language sports media) is BallinEurope’s man in Italy, Francesco Cappelletti. As the season progresses, Cappelletti will be opining as to what really went down in a week’s worth of Euroleague matches. Today, four key themes that will be […]
Sixty-eight Fearless Predictions™ for 2010-11 Euroleague season
With the EL tipoff game tonight, BallinEurope is feeling devotion … not to mention a rush of Fearless Predictions™ coming on. How crazy can BiE get? You be the judge; here are 68 prognostications on all things Euroleague which you may [laugh uproariously about] ponder. Enjoy the season, everyone! (And sign up for the BallinEurope […]
Navarro to Gasol: FC Barcelona will beat Lakers
In an age of disposal guarantees made by athletes, Juan Carlos Navarro’s newest claim is nevertheless noteworthy – even if he was half-joking. The ACB official site today reports on conversation between the FC Barcelona stud and the Los Angeles Lakers’ Pau Gasol, whose teams will face off tomorrow night in the most intriguing match […]
Around the world with NBA Live, Euroleague American tour
The NBA Live Europe tour begins tonight when the New York Knicks visit AJ Milano; tomorrow sees the Los Angeles Lakers take on the Minnesota Timberwolves in London and Maccabi Haifa visiting the New Jersey Nets. All in all, the exchange program between the two big leagues will see nine games played in four countries, […]
Nikola Pekovic: Best tattoo in the NBA – no, the Universe
Media day in the NBA gave a lot of newbies, unknowns and ubiquitous presences (see coverage of Miami Thrice schmoozing at right) alike the chance to know and be known. Minnesota Timberwolves fans and players alike are well enthusiastic about their new addition Nikola Pekovic, who’s already generating hilarious quotes from his teammates with just […]
European players in the NBA for 2010-11 (or, Come on, Raptors, sign Primoz Brezec already) [UPDATED]
With NBA teams starting to get warmed up for the regular season tipoff, BallinEurope figured it high time to take stock of the European players prospectively set to take the court in America for 2010-11. In considering the expanded rosters for each of the 30 NBA teams, BiE counted 50 players from The Continent plus […]
Official BallinEurope Power Rankings: Pre-knockouts edition
Now that noted astrophysicist Stephen Hawking has announced God’s non-existence in our universe through mathematics, maybe he can start working on explaining the FIBA tie-breaking procedure. No, no, don’t start on BiE; it’s as easy as dialing up Wikipedia to find the steps in determining seeding for tournament play: Placement is determined based on, in […]