International Basketball

With the NBA enjoying a vacation that may not end as scheduled, and the PBA also taking a break, basketball on TV has gotten a shot in the arm with the games from the international basketball scene. While the UAAP takes care of filling the thirst for local basketball, the various Olympic qualifier tournaments across the globe are a great off the bench “substitution” while the NBA is on a break.

Fresh on BTV these days are the Eurobasket 2011 and FIBA Americas, the two biggest basketball turfs in the world. With international basketball creating a great influence on pro ball, one can’t help but notice the presence of probably the most number of NBA players seeing action for their respective countries. On top of the list is Dirk Nowitzki who’s leading the German attach at the Eurobasket. Chris Kaman is the only other notable on the roster that isn’t likely to give Nowitzki another trophy to add to his NBA ring. Spain is known to be one of the best basketball countries that has won an Olympic gold medal and a FIBA world championship, and we see why. With Pau and Marc Gasol beefing up the frontline, Spain is hard to beat. They also have more solid and legitimate NBA players in Rudy Fernandez (Portland), Ricky Rubio (Minnesota), Jose Calderon (Toronto) and Serge Ibaka (Oklahoma). And how can we fail to mention the “Navarro” on the team: Juan Carlos. If he’s a Navarro, then he must be good. France has Tony Parker, Joakim Noah, Boris Diaw, and Nicolas Batum. Others to mention include Hedo Turkoglu, Omer Asik of Turkey, Andrei Kirilenko and Timofey Mozgov of Russia, Andrea Bargnani, Danilo Gallinari of Italy. There are a few others whose names I can’t recall for now, but this goes to show that Europe is very much in the main stream of things as far as basketball stars are concerned.

Another interesting point to observe is that although NBA players are recognized to deliver the goods for their countries, there are teams that don’t have big names but can actually top the favorites. Russia, Serbia, Greece and Lithuania are tops on this list. And if you look up their rosters, you won’t see too many familiar names. But to date, all these teams are undefeated in their respective groups at the Eurobasket.

 The FIBA Americas isn’t as loaded as Europe. Most notable players would be Manu Ginobili of Argentina whose star really shone at the FIBA tournaments before he moved to the NBA. Helping the Argentine cause are Luis Scola, Andres Nocioni and Carlos Delfino. Others worth mentioning are Brazil’s Tiaggo Splitter, Carlos Arroyo and JJ Barea (Puerto Rico) and Al Horford (Dominican Republic).

The interesting thing to take note of about these games is their style of play. Often dubbed as the “international style” of play, it’s different from that of the NBA. While the NBA will teach our kids to be flashier and adopt a showbiz way of style, the international style teaches us how to play the basics of the game. For starters, you’ll notice that almost all players from Europe and South America have the same shooting style, whether he be a big man or a guard. Nowitzki is a good example. At 7 feet tall, he shoots even better from outside than some of the better guards and forwards. Have you also seen the way they handle the ball? Although they don’t look as entertaining as the Americans, they actually have better ball-handling skills than the Americans who prefer the cross-over and razzle-dazzle way of dribbling the ball against the basics of simply pushing the ball forward to a destination and making the proper adjustments when protecting the ball from a defender. The irony of it all is that the Americans have more turnovers while handling the ball the fancy way than the European players. Have you seen the difference between the dribbling of Dwight Howard and Nowtizki/Gasol brothers?

Passing is another facet of the game that we should copy from the Europeans. They’ve mastered the art of moving the ball up the court by passing the ball and not dribbling the ball up court. The Americans like to go coast to coast even against a trap while Europeans simply stop dribbling, pass the ball from one player to another, which is the easier and faster way to get the ball to the front courts for a basket. As they say, why make things difficult when there’s an easier way to get it done.

 But how did they get to become better at the basics than the Americans? The not so secret key is that they were all trained with the basics when they were younger. All European countries have practically the same “basics school” being taught to all players. That’s why you’ll see many Europeans having the same shooting and ball-handling styles. Moreover, they don’t move on to the big leagues unless they’ve mastered the basics. No short cuts. Just pure hard work and mastery of one’s basics. They’re not as spectacular-looking as the Americans but they get the job done.

 So if you want to learn how to play, check out the Eurobasket and FIBA Americas games on TV now. Now I know one reason why we Pinoys haven’t gotten too far in basketball. I think we learned too much of the “bad” basics, and looked up to a wrong model.

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 Time-out: Happy birthday to Don Paolo Navarro. >>> you can reach me at [email protected].