The Official European Basketball thread

[Antonio]

Since you guys are starting to get curious about it...

[Antonio]

Some fresh news: former NBA playmaker Earl Boykins will play in Italy. He signed a 1 year $ 3.5mln contract to play for the Virtus Bologna team. It's the most expensive signing of the summer in Italy. Bologna won't play in the European most famous tournment called Euroleague cause he didn't qualify for it.

[Antonio]

<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch/v/ICI6uGPSfvU" target="_blank" class="new_win">http://www.youtube.com/watch/v/ICI6uGPSfvU</a>

This is the video of the presentation of phenom Brandon Jennings, who recently signed to italian team Virtus Roma, in Rome. Roma signed him to a 3 years contract, but he has a buy-out after next summer. They signed his young brother too, to the youth team. I dunno how much they paid for him tho, it wasn't announced.

He'll join Primo Brezec too, who also signed to Roma.

[Antonio]

Qyntel Woods, a former first round pick of the Portland TrailBlazers, has signed with Fortitudo Bologna in Italy for a two year contract worth approx. $2.2 million.

['EclipZe]

Russian League: Gordan Giricek arrives to Triumph, Enisey extends four players

After signing of 1+1 deal worth 6 million euros with Serbian center Nenad Krstic (213-C-83), Triumph Lyubertsy grabbed another NBA player. It is Croat Gordan Giricek (197-G-77), who put signature on one-year deal. During this season Giricek will earn 2.5 million euros. Giricek is coming from Phoenix Suns with 5.8 ppg, 1.7 rpg and 1.1 apg for 56 games last season in total. He started it in Utah Jazz but in December he was traded to 76ers for Kyle Korver.

[Antonio]

ITALIAN LEAGUE:

1. MONTEPASCHI SIENA - It's the best team in Italy by far. They don't have NBA players acquired this season, so you probably won't find the description interesting. Anyway.. the star of the team is TERRELL McINTYRE, a former Tigers from Clemson University who played in Europe after University. He was been the MVP of last season, and he's probably the best PG in Italy. Not spectacular, but he has high IQ and he's perfect for European basketball. The SG/SF is ROMAIN SATO, a vertical player who can jump, defend and score. He's from Xavier University, and he was selected with the #52 draft pick by the Spurs in 2004. The other SG is BOOTSY THORTON, an american player who made a name of himself in Europe. High IQ, good professionist, good all-around player. Another superstar of the team is RIMANTAS KAUKENAS from Lithuania. Another guard who can score, who has size and who can play inside. The team recently acquired former Nuggets and Seattle PG MIKE WILKS too. The PF is team Captain and superstar SHAUN ANDREW STONEROOK from Ohio State University. A big man who can basically do everything on the floor, playing point forward too. Very high IQ, great defence, he can shoot from 3pts too. The C of the team is BENJAMIN EZE from Nigeria. He's phisically a monster, and he's very intimidating on defence. Globally the team has a very very deep roster (in Europe only 5 players can sit on the bench), a good italian coach, plays great defence and execute very well on offence too. Siena is probably considered one of the top-5 teams in Europe at the moment.


Terrell McIntyre, Shaun Stonerook & Romain Sato


Rimantas Kaukenas, Bootsy Thorton & Benjamin Eze

[wcsoldier]

^^^^ good shit homie , they are with Nancy, (a town which is about 50 km from where I live), in Euroleague .. I'll be at the game 

[Now_Im_Not_Banned]

Maccabi=best team in Europe.

[OG Hack Wilson]

Maccabi=best team in Europe.

if you put them in the NBA how would they fare?


what about if you seeded them #16 in the NCAA tourney?

[Antonio]

Maccabi=best team in Europe.

Imho it's CSKA Moscow. They have what i consider the best coach in Europe and def one of the best coaches in the whole world (NBA included): italian coach Ettore Messina. A genius. Anyway Maccabi is probably the 2nd best team right now (and my fav non-italian team) and is with CSKA the team who dominated the last 5-6 years in Europe.

[Antonio]

Maccabi=best team in Europe.

if you put them in the NBA how would they fare?

It depends. They play a different type of basketball in Europe than in the NBA. It's less spectacular, more technical, more defence, zonal defence, different rules too. They'd adapt to the new league and start to play a little bit different. Anyway each summer a lot of NBA teams come here playing preseason games against some of the best teams in Europe. And it's happening a lot that they're loosing. Maccabi and CSKA are def better than 70-80% of the teams who didn't make the postseason last year. Hands down. They can't compete with the elite teams tho. Different budget. I mean they don't build teams to compete with the Lakers, the Spurs, the Pistons. They build teams to compete in Euroleague and in the Israeli championship.

what about if you seeded them #16 in the NCAA tourney?

They'd win it or at least go to the F4. They are by far superior imho.

[Antonio]

ITALIAN LEAGUE:

2. VIRTUS ROMA. They lost to Siena in the Finals last year. But they did some spectacular trades this summer, so they probably reached Siena in terms of quality of the roster. The GM of the team is a former European legend Dejan Bodiroga, one of the best players ever from Europe. You probably heard of him. The coach is another European legend, JASMIN REPESA, the coach of Croatia at the Olympic games.Talking about the roster, well let's start with the last signings: the phenomenal BRANDON JENNINGS (yes, the wonderkid from college) will play PG, and former NBA player PRIMOZ BREZEC will play Center (he's getting about $1 mln per year). They'll probably dominate, here. Or at least that's what Bodiroga thinks about them. Jennings signed a 3-years deal with a buyout clause after 1 year. Brezec i think he signed a 2 years deal. Other important players are "IBBY" JABEER, a former Pennsylvania University player who played pretty well with the Pistons in the Las Vegas Summer League and earned a contract with a greek team, and then with Rome. Another good player is SANI BECIROVIC, a PG/SG who early in his career was considered similiar to Drazen Petrovic. Very versatile player, he can handle the ball very well, he can penetrate inside, he can shoot from 3pts and he can pass the ball. An universal player, very very good. He won Euroleague with Panatinaikos in 2007 and was signed to a 1 year contract by Roma this season to drastically improve the team (Jennings+Becirovic is probably the best combo in Italy). They have another former NCAA Champion (with Michigan State, 2000) and NBA player (selected with the #52 draft pick by the Bucks) in SF ANDRE HUTSON. The last player who might be interesting to mention is ALLAN RAY, who played with the Celtics (lol) last season, and who is a former Villanova player. The other players are italian veterans like GIGLI, GABINI and TONOLLI. Let's say their roster ain't as deep as Siena, but they have 3 superstars in JENNINGS, BREZEC and BECIROVIC who can do damage in Italy and in Euroleague. I expect them to do well.


Brandon Jennings, Primoz Brezec & Ibby Jabeer


Sani Becirovic, Allan Ray & Andre Hutson

[Antonio]

RUSSIAN LEAGUE

1. CSKA MOSCOW. Hands down the best team in Europe at the moment along with Maccabi Tel-Aviv. They have what i consider the best coach in Europe in Ettore Messina (he's italian), and they won 2 Euroleague Cup's (the most prestigius trophy in Europe) in 2006 and 2008, loosing in the Final in 2007. It's the former team of Kirilenko, Giricek and Songalia. They have a roster so deep that it's hard to say who's the real star of the team. The one you might probably remember is TRAJAN LANGDON, a former Duke player who played with Team USA in the 1998 World Cup and who had a short career in the NBA with the Cleveland Cavs. He's a terrific shooter from 3pts, a real specialist. He can score from everywhere. He was been named the MVP of the 2008 Euroleague Final. A real killer. Another great player is greek guard NIKOLAS ZISIS. He was been named best young prospect in europe by FIBA 2 years ago. He's still very young, but he has a lot of experience, since he's been around from years. He might be the next one to go to the NBA.

(to be continued..) (sorry i'm at work)

[Now_Im_Not_Banned]

Maccabi=best team in Europe.

if you put them in the NBA how would they fare?


what about if you seeded them #16 in the NCAA tourney?

They'd fuck shit up in an NCAA tourney...in the NBA, they could probably be a playoff team in the East. LOL.

[Now_Im_Not_Banned]

Maccabi=best team in Europe.

Imho it's CSKA Moscow. They have what i consider the best coach in Europe and def one of the best coaches in the whole world (NBA included): italian coach Ettore Messina. A genius. Anyway Maccabi is probably the 2nd best team right now (and my fav non-italian team) and is with CSKA the team who dominated the last 5-6 years in Europe.

I dunno about that after the acquisition of Carlos Arroyo...