NSR: Basketball 2.0

I'm confused as to what Pacers are doing.

First they signed Gerald Green. A move that, depending on the terms of contract, I like.

But then they traded Darren Collison and Dahntay Jones to Mavs for backup Center Ian Mahinmi.

Combined with a loss of Price, all of a sudden Pacers have no true PG. I guess they think Stephenson is ready to take over the backup role and maybe rookie Orlando Johnson can play the point a bit, but they are all more of Combo guards.

Bird gave Donnie the keys and now Donnie is doing doughnuts in the parking lot.

Thought we could get more for DC I'm really confused. Getting him for Troy Murphy was a steal and now we give him up for some backup center after we just drafted Plumlee. Really weird. I guess if we get Augustin and Green (preferably someone better) it will work out and it would be a slight upgrade.

Nice what do you think?

Completely confused. Why not get at least a pick for Collison? He's not good enough to be a starting PG for a top team, but he's certainly valuable. Don't understand the point of trading him to Dallas to sign an unrestricted FA. I'm also not clear on why the Pacers are getting Gerald Green - he reproduces a lot of what Granger/George do, but no one knows if he'll play defense. An odd summer for them, and they didn't even try to sign Gordon to a max deal (which will be matched, but whatever). I don't see how they got any better, and paying Hill $8mm a year seems excessive.

Idk about the whole cap situation but could it have to do with them wanting to get Oj Mayo?

Even if it did, why would they want Mayo? They're already playing George at the 2, where would Mayo play? They're also negotiating with Augustin, as I understand it, but I'm not sure why that's much of an upgrade over Collison.

So looks like we signed Green and the Bobcats just signed Session. Prolly going to get Augustin?

I guess this is a slight upgrade possibly but really just reshuffling the cards. Pretty much the same as we were with a few new guys.

One good thing (if we get Augustin) is DC was going to be a restricted FA next season and if we didn't have faith to keep him at least we lock up his replacement for 4 years...

Not sure it's an upgrade, but it is a bit moot. At least Mahinmi is better than Amundsen.

I dont know it seems theyve been after Mayo for a while. All the espn "sources" are saying theyre making another run at Mayo. Mayo would maybe bring something new to them.

Looks like we are signing Augustin to a 1-yr deal and paying more for him than DC lol I don't get it. Do we have some master plan for next summer at PG???

Nice do you think Kevin Pritchard was a good replacement for us? You think he's pulling the strings on this and Walsh is just giving the final world or what?

Why is Russia not in the Olympics?

U.S. is kinda junk without their athleticism and forced turnovers. They go on those huge bursts where they score quickly off turnovers but other than that look average. I understand they don't play together for long so its hard to gel, but c'mon, these guys are supposed to be the best in the world. Completely unconvincing to me, hopefully they look better in the Olympics. Secretly hoping Spain or Argentina beat them lol

So, no Mayo

This doesn't seem like a Pritchard move at all. Pirtchard loves collecting assets - why give Collison away for the rights to pay Mahinmi? Just a weird, weird move. I don't think Augustin is better, either. He might fit the Pacers a bit better, but Collison was arguably the best Pacer player against Miami. Seems an odd move.

The US roster is short of bigs at the moment, since Bosh, Howard and Griffin are out, so without them, the US is going to rely on what it does best - athleticism. Given that their athleticism is miles beyond any other team, that makes a lot of sense. It's also easiest to teach - pressing defense doesn't need a lot of time to gel, while complex offensive sets do.

Not enough Americans to naturalize.

As a matter of fact Russia will field a team for the olympics, lol.

Been watching the friendlies and they keep posting the 2 groups but I could've sworn Russia wasn't in there. Good.

That was crazy that Calipari was coaching Puerto Rico! I guess they narrowly lost out on a spot to Nigeria. Even had Rod Strickland as an asst. coach lol

Yea that was random with Caliperi.

After losing to Venezuela, Nigeria beat Lithuania, Greece and Dominican Republic to qualify.

Impressive. But it gets harder from here. They are in a group of death.

Interesting decision by Blatt to not add another PF to replace the injured Vorontsevich. Instead he decided to add another SG, Voronov.

Also, I was really hoping to see both Karasev and Kulagin on the roster. The former made it, but Blatt chose to go with mediocre Khvostov instead of the much more talented Kulagin for the #3 PG spot.

Kirilenko is coming back to the NBA with the Wolves. Always been a big AK-47 fan.

A friend of mine was arguing that he is better than Kukoc, what's your take on that?

Well I know I'm not being asked but Kirilenko had that one season which was above anything Kukoc ever reached. That's all I'm saying, that one season.

Thats not an unreasonable position.

One of the funniest things on that sick Dream Team show on NBA TV was how MJ and Pippen just dominated Kukoc when the US played Croatia during the Olympics. They were pissed that the Bulls' owner was trying to spend big bucks on a euro foreigner, and so they literally only let him score like 4 points during the entire game haha. Amazing stuff.

Not really. It just seems like a typical dick move from MJ and Scottie

^ dude this was Olympic competition, they were going all out to dominate every game. It's not like they were taking cheap shots at him, but rather just dominant d

Fotios Katsikaris takes over for Blatt at Russian national team. Hopefully they'll do well.

Meanwhile, Alexey Shved with another great game for T-Wolves. He has made a very nice transition to NBA game. There is still a lot of upside to his game.