British - losers?

[Scaly piscine]

NBA & MLB teams especially tend to have plenty of foreigners in but the teams are always American/Canadian in name. USA weren't too clever in the olympics basketball or baseball tho (I think they got bronze in both), their basketball team was beaten a few times in fact.

Getting back to the thing about knocking the best Brit sportsmen I think most of it stems from the gutter press and most sensible people (obviously excluding journalists here, who are generally useless) are level-headed about it and appreciate them.

 

[maxpower]

Please name the teams in the NBA or MLB that are from outside the USA and Canada. Id like to know because im pretty sure ive never seen a team from anywhere else.
So to call yourselves world champions after beating teams from two countries is a joke at best.

Like I said any country is allowed to join as per NBA rules, now it has not happend due to the nature of schedule of NBA (80+ games). As I said earlier NBA is working on expanding it in asia and other countries, and thats why more preseason games are played in Japan, China and some other countries. As per dominance, baring this year's olympic debacle USA has dominated the gold medal category (http://members.aol.com/bradleyrd/olympics.html) this is not an offical link but I did not have time for finding official links. If Olympics is not world enough than I dont know what is. Just as in cricket current AUS test team is 1st and the rest of the teams far distant, USA basketball ball teams are a country mile ahead of any other teams in the world, although the gap is slowing closing as shown by the # of european players in NBA now.

 

[maxpower]

I thought Cuba were better at basketball!?

you thought wrong, cuba has very good baseball players who play in MLB in US.

 

[Anil]

I thought Cuba were better at basketball!?

a full-strength u.s team with all their top professionals would definitely be the best team in the world, although it is still ridiculous to call the nba champions world champions.

 

[maxpower]

a full-strength u.s team with all their top professionals would definitely be the best team in the world, although it is still ridiculous to call the nba champions world champions.

i'll tell you what is ridiculous, shoaib is the faster bowler in the world, when there are so many MLB pitchers who chuck 100mph or more everyday

 

[Scaly piscine]

a full-strength u.s team with all their top professionals would definitely be the best team in the world, although it is still ridiculous to call the nba champions world champions.

Not interested in ifs and buts, the team that went to the olympics didn't win so it isn't the best in the World and hypothetical teams don't win anything either.

 

[Scaly piscine]

i'll tell you what is ridiculous, shoaib is the faster bowler in the world, when there are so many MLB pitchers who chuck 100mph or more everyday

Exaggerating somewhat there, I've seen baseball on TV plenty of times and it's pretty rare when anyone hits 100mph

 

[BoyBrumby]

i'll tell you what is ridiculous, shoaib is the faster bowler in the world, when there are so many MLB pitchers who chuck 100mph or more everyday

Er, tres bollo! 100mph is just as rare in baseball. The quickest speed at which a baseball has been pitched is 100.9 mph by Lynn Nolan Ryan of the California Angels way back on August 20th 1974.

You have to remember although they "chuck", as it were, they don't have the kinetic energy from the run-up of an Ahktar or a Lee.

 

[maxpower]

ok so its not funny when I have to explain the joke. I used shoaib as some ppl think he chucks, and MLB pitches do that too. I still think its funny. Also the nolan ryan 100.9 mph was with gunniess world of records, hes pitched faster in regular games, and others who hit the 100mph mark quite often are Mariano Rivera, Billy Wagner, and few others. So all in all it was a JOKE ON CHUCKING.

 

[maxpower]

Not interested in ifs and buts, the team that went to the olympics didn't win so it isn't the best in the World and hypothetical teams don't win anything either.

if your memory is only good till the last olympics than yes they lost this time. If you want to look at basketball history in olympics then here it is, I'll only post the first 2 countries as the rest dont matter:

Place Country Gold Silver Bronze Total
1 USA 17 3 3 23
2 Soviet Union 4 4 4 12

http://www.insidehoops.com/olympic-basketball-history.shtml
check the stats and see if you think its not dominating against the "world".

 

[BoyBrumby]

ok so its not funny when I have to explain the joke. I used shoaib as some ppl think he chucks, and MLB pitches do that too. I still think its funny. Also the nolan ryan 100.9 mph was with gunniess world of records, hes pitched faster in regular games, and others who hit the 100mph mark quite often are Mariano Rivera, Billy Wagner, and few others. So all in all it was a JOKE ON CHUCKING.

Ah. Sorry!

Your sense of humour was just a little bit too clever & subtle for me at this hour (it's five to midnight here). Your two smilies should've given it away tho, even to a cretin like me!

 

[tooextracool]

How often has he played him since he's risen to the top though?

one was in rotterdam in feb this year and the other one that i remember clearly was the masters in nov/dec last year.

 

[Kent]

And some of us love to describe ourselves as champions of the substandard. We love to knock ourselves.

Isn't that more of a human thing than a British thing though?

At 22 I guess I'm no expert, but I've spent a bit of time in 3 countries - NZ, Australia and the US. In the first two the tall poppy syndrome is definitely there, despite our image as 'punch above our weight', egalitarian places.

America is a bit different. It's probably a fair generalisation that it's part of their culture right from grade school for stars to shine, where "second is the first loser". Because of this there's a lot of people who end up cheering from the sidelines, getting fat and living vicariously. Pro sports, Hollywood, the military etc. all form a glittering facade that makes a lot of Americans feel pretty good about themselves.

Although I'm not a 'commie', I've always felt this celebration of success seems to make the malcontents that much worse. Rather than just make snide remarks about the supposedly "successful", you risk having kids take guns to school instead.

 

[Son Of Coco]

you thought wrong, cuba has very good baseball players who play in MLB in US.

I just realised I typed 'basketball', I meant baseball - sincere apologies. I'm not sure why I typed the other but I think I might be somewhat dyslexic on the old keyboard.

 

[Son Of Coco]

Didn't Ian Roberts come out as a homosexualist whilst still playing?

I remember finding it slightly amusing he played for the North Queensland Cowboys

Yeah, the big fella could fight too, was a tough player.

 

[Son Of Coco]

one was in rotterdam in feb this year and the other one that i remember clearly was the masters in nov/dec last year.

and he beat him twice? He should give our Leyton a few tips.....although hopefully next month....

 

[Craig]

I found it strange during the Rugby World Cup in 2003 the English rugby team was still getting critised and in England yet they were still winning their games easily. I thought the goal was to win not put 60 past the opposition in doing so. And there was those silly "pundits" in the English media for having a go at the England cricket team for lossing to South Africa 'A'.

Since when does losing a tour match mean much in the over all grand scheme of things?

 

[marc71178]

As shown by the first Test, nothing!

 

[David]

The US are current Union Olympic Champions but that isn't worth a damn, so past results for basketball don't matter currently either :P

 

[Craig]

In all honesty the way England are going it wouldn't surprise me if England keep on their winning ways. In fact I expect them to.