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Award-winning columnist Tom Archdeacon — an old-school storyteller in a brand-new venue — writes about sports, the city, southwest Ohio and anything else that catches his fancy… or yours.Home > Blogs > Through the Arch > Archives > 2008 > June > 23 > Entry
Blog: A Redd, right and gold Olympic basketball team?
Just a couple of hours ago, USA Basketball announced its team for the Beijing Olympic Games, the stage where anything less than a gold medal for the U.S. hoopsters will be perceived — and rightly so — as a failure.
The 12 man roster — selected on the final approval of new basketball czar and former Phoenix Suns and Arizona Diamondbacks owner Jerry Colangelo and coached by Duke’s Mike Krzyzewski — includes Kobe Bryant, LeBron James, Michael Redd, Dwyane Wade, Chris Paul, Carmelo Anthony, Jason Kidd, Chris Bosh, Dwight Howard, Deron Williams, Tayshaun Prince and Carlos Boozer.
Great lengths have been taken to right the U.S. ship after the embarrassment at the Athens Games in 2004. That group — filled with NBA All-Stars, but not resembling a team — went 5-3 in Greece, losing to Puerto Rico, Lithuania and then Argentina in the medal round. They picked up a bronze medal and a lot of criticism when they got home.
There was plenty blame to go around. It was USA Basketball’s fault for the process it used to put a team together on the fly that couldn’t shoot, was undersized and — because it didn’t require a major pre-Games time commitment from the players — had had little time practicing with each other before Athens.
Coach Larry Brown seemed to lose his team half-way through the Games and there were the players, some of whom played the role of spoiled millionaires, pouting, bickering and openly challenging their coach.
And so Allen Iverson and Stephon Marbury are not on this team. But Carmelo Anthony — grown up from those disgruntled days in Greece — is because, as Krzyzewski told some us a while back when we met in Chicago, “our players get it now.”
Colangelo was dismayed by what he saw transpire in Athens:
“Body language has always been a key ingredient in basketball. You learn so much how people communicate — or don’t. What I saw there was very bad. And when I heard and saw how people in our country felt and spoke and wrote about that team it was evident a change needed to take place.”
Part of the problem, too, is that the gap between the US and the rest of the basketball world has shrunk. The dominating days of that 1992 Dream Team — the first group of NBA Olympians that included Michael Jordan, Larry Bird and Magic Johnson with bench players like David Robinson, Karl Malone, and John Stockton — are gone.
“In some respects, we’ve been a little bit arrogant about the game,” Krzyzewski said. “It is not our game. It is the world’s game now. It just originated here.”
These days there are something like 75 international players in the NBA, representing 30 countries and many of those guys are the cornerstones of their own national teams..
To combat all this, USA Basketball put Colangelo in charge. He picked Krzyzewski and then met with a group of former Olympic coaches and star Olympians, everyone from Jordan to Jerry West.
With their suggestions, Colangelo invited 33 players to the Senior National team. He informed them he needed a three-year commitment — the team had 42 practices in 2006, 24 last year and is in the midst of a lot more this season — and he was looking for guys to embrace the team concept.
The best story he told from those meetings involves Michael Redd, the Ohio State product from Columbus who is now a star shooting guard for the Milwaukee Bucks.
“Michael Redd stands out,” Colangelo said. “I set up here in Chicago and met with various players. LeBron James was coming in with Cleveland and I talked to (Kirk) Heinrich with the Bulls and some other guys.
“Michael said he’s drive down from Milwaukee. He showed up at my hotel, called my room and then knocked at the door. He was in his sweats and had a hanging bag over his shoulder.
“He asked to be excused and went into the john. He put on a suit and tie and came out to have the interview with me. That was pretty damn impressive.”
He and Krzyzewski both raved about Redd — not only for his professionalism and that explosive offense he can provide on the court — but for the ego-less attitude he has shown. They talked about how he’s been willing to come off the bench and play a role.
Consequently, they said, all of the other players have embraced him as something special.
That’s a sign that this team may be special, as well.
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