Pippen not "best player" in Scandanavian league

[eboloid]

Ew Gooden.

Never forget.

[ikoiko]

you think no players in the swedish or finnish league are more talented than, say, jaron collins?

[Lebowski]

Bah I wrote a long text about basketball here in Sweden but I got logged out and text got deleted...

Anyway, cliff notes:
I dont see a swedish player, any time soon, being a star in NBA/Europe except from our own league. Still, most stars in our league are the imports so really we dont even have any real swedish stars in our own league..

Thanks to Pippen for playing here tho, was at the game and the small "arena" was packed (2,800 in attendance) and spirits were high ! :)

Basketball hasnt been this hot (it hasnt been hot at all) in Sweden since Magic played here.. like 5 years ago.

[adamcz]

I made the thread title slightly better. Let's try not to be too misleading.

[DCL]

remember pippen's last years in chicago (2nd time around)? if you don't remember, don't worry because it wasn't memorable. but he was 38 at the time. it was time to go because he lost about.... say, a dozen steps or so.

well, he's 42 now and will be 43 for the next season. that's pretty "ancient" in professional basketball years. if he was already a dinosaur back in 2004, he's close to being a fossil soon.

even though he had some years off to rest, it's unlikely his athletic ability nor health have improved from the last time he was in the nba. due to age, the body, knees, and lung tank just aren't going to hold up. and it's not like he was playing like a freak of nature at 38. he might have had the mindset and iq, but his body was already well below average in the nba when he retired.

he looks like he's tearing finnish assho!es now, but that's the point - he's playing in freaking finland or scandinavia or wherever the hell he is...

[Finn T-Mac]

Pippen was in shape but played horrible in those two games in Finland. I watched the game agains Honka and man he was sleeping the whole time on the floor. But...it was the jet lag and the fact that he's getting old. He's shots looked great but those just didn't go in.

Koponen has been hitting the gym. Atleast it's starting to show, he's getting larger and not fatter. At the start of the season he's shot didn't fall as much cause the time in the weight room but now it starts to get better. Hopefully the Blazers take him in next season cause he can be a good player but still needs to get some work in with better and more experienced NBA vets.

heard that Drew Gooden is Half Finnish. I am not saying that he is better than Koponen but if he never played in the USA Team ( HS/ College) he can actually played for the Finnish National Team in the near future.

And that's true, there was even a article in Slam magazine long time ago. And I have a friend whos friend is Drews cousin :) Hope he'll play some day for Finland (no chance)

[saKf]

Old man Pippen on the Blazers was a top ten favorite of mine all-time. It gave me a pleasure similar to watching old man Jordan.

[Kobe24]

Drew Gooden's father's name is Andrew Gooden? So his son's name will be something like Rew Gooden or Ew Gooden.

You're stupid. Drew is short for Andrew.

[fatboy11]

Pippen playing in Scandonavia?

When did this happen?

[bumpyknucks]

With regards to the comments somebody made about the defense in that league.....the game he played was against the worst team in the league, a team thats only won 2 games the entire year. Obviously, if you watched Seattle play, your impression of NBA defense would be notably different than if you watched the Spurs.

[Jasper]

Pippen playing in Scandonavia?

When did this happen?

HAd a conversation about this the other day ... .these old guys play because of the love of the game ... and their competitive juices may not make them the best golfers ... Ask the Chuckster.

[32MJ32]

My home league (I'm Australian), the NBL, has a heap of ex and borderline NBA guys come and go every season. A few are MVP-calbire, a few are useless but most fit in the okay-to-good-to-very-good category.

Julius Hodge, Sean Lampley, Orien Greene, Homicide Williams, Rick Rickerts, Rod Grizzard and Juaquin Hawkins are some of the dudes playing here at the moment. Homicide is probably playing the best out of the bunch but he wont make the All NBL-First Team or even Second Team. The rest of them are solid contributors but there are a lot of guys here that will never touch an NBA floor that are playing a lot better.

A lot of NBA 12th men and even rotation guys would come down here and get killed. It doesn't surprise me that it's the same in Scandanavia.

[DCL]

A lot of NBA 12th men and even rotation guys would come down here and get killed. It doesn't surprise me that it's the same in Scandanavia.

you mean kill it; not get killed?

[TheHonestTruth]

He's not the best player in the Scandinavian league. He probably got schooled big time there.

[32MJ32]

you mean kill it; not get killed?

No. As I said, the ex-NBA guys that play down here have mixed results. Most are good but some aren't. I'm sure you think you could step off a plane and into a NBL game and drop 25 but Julius Hodge is putting up 13 per at the moment. Orien Greene 12 per. Rickert 17 per. They all had NBA deals as recently as a couple of months ago. Sean Lampley's getting no more than 15 (can't be bothered looking it up). Merely making the NBA doesn't mean you can roll through any other country and kill it. Those guys are doing fine but there are a few dudes who