There will be some top-flight NBA talent playing in EuroBasket this September. Giannis Antetokounmpo — and all three of his brothers — will
suit up for Greece. Nikola Jokic will play for Serbia. Rudy Gobert will play for France. Domantas Sabonis will lace them up for Lithuania. Now
add Goran Dragic to a Slovenian team that already had Luka Doncic signed up. I’M BACK ….. 🇸🇮🇸🇮🇸🇮 #TheDragon 🐲🔥 @kzs_si @EuroBasket
pic.twitter.com/ebV1VnnqM6 — Goran Dragić (@Goran_Dragic) August 5, 2022 Dragic scored 35 points in the championship game to lead Slovenia to the 2017 EuroBasket
championship. He is a legend in his home nation and someone who can still contribute to winning basketball. There was some concern about getting the proper insurance for the two NBA players on the team, but that has been worked out. Slovenia finished fourth in the 2020 Olympics, getting out of group play and beating Germany in the first medal round,
but then losing in the semifinals to France. Australia beat Slovenia in the bronze medal game. They enter EuroBasket as a team with a legitimate chance to medal. In EuroBasket 2022, Slovenia is in Group B with old friends Germany and France, as well as Hungary, Lithuania, and Bosnia and Herzegovina. That is a stacked group, but the top
four will advance to the 16-team medal round (finishing higher in the group should make the path through the single-elimination rounds easier). Dragic will play for the Bulls as a backup point guard this season and could be a big boost to Chicago’s bench. BERLIN — For Spain, almost all of the names on the national team’s roster have changed in recent years. The expectations didn’t. And neither did the results. Juancho Hernangomez scored 27 points, his brother Willy Hernangomez added 14 and won tournament MVP honors, and Spain topped France 88-76 on Sunday to
win the EuroBasket gold medal. It was Spain’s fourth European championship in its last six tries, all those golds coming under coach Sergio Scariolo. Lorenzo Brown scored 14 points and had 11 assists for Spain, while Jaime Fernandez scored 13. Evan Fournier led France — which also dropped the gold-medal game at the Tokyo Olympics to the U.S. last summer — with 23 points, with Thomas Heurtel scored 16 and Guerschon Yabusele added 13. Rudy Gobert was held to only six points on just two shots from the field for France. “Spain played better from start to finish,” Fournier said. “They had a clear game plan and we did not execute ours well enough. … We never really had control of the game. They just played better, man, period.” This was supposed to be a rebuilding summer for Spain. Pau and Marc Gasol, the longtime leaders of the program, retired from international following a quarterfinal loss to the U.S. at the Tokyo Games. Sergio Rodriguez also decided last summer was the right time to walk away, after 16 years with the national team. Sergio Llull and Ricky Rubio, two more of veterans, couldn’t play because of injuries. The winning tradition simply continued anyway. Spain is now the reigning Basketball World Cup (won in China in 2019) along with EuroBasket champion. It has also medaled in 10 of its last 11 EuroBasket appearances. For France, it was another medal — and another instance of coming up a bit short of the shiniest medal. France’s last major crown came in winning EuroBasket in 2013. Since then, the French have won two bronzes at the World Cup (2014, 2019), a bronze at EuroBasket (2015), silver at the Tokyo Olympics, and now, silver again. The difference was clear: Spain held a massive 35-7 edge in points off turnovers. “Today, obviously, we have lost the gold,” France coach Vincent Collet said. “They executed their plan perfect.” Juancho Hernangomez was 6-for-6 from 3-point range in a 6-minute span of the second quarter, helping Spain extend what was a 23-14 lead into a 45-26 edge with just about 3 minutes left in the half. It was perhaps a mildly unlikely source for a 3-point barrage. He had made a total of 12 3′s in his eight previous games in this year’s EuroBasket tournament, and his high in any NBA game is six. An 11-0 run helped France cut what had been a 21-point deficit to just 47-37 at the half — and the momentum carried into the third quarter. Yabusele’s jumper with 6:52 left in the third got France within 49-46, and everything seemed to be shifting. But Spain held on. Juancho Hernangomez’s seventh 3-pointer with 7:29 left made it a 71-61 game, and the outcome wasn’t in doubt again. BRONZE MEDAL: GERMANY 82, POLAND 69In the bronze-medal matchup earlier Sunday, Dennis Schroder scored 26 points and host Germany held off Poland. It was Germany’s first EuroBasket medal since winning silver in 2005. Poland matched its best finish in the event since 1971. “They told me it’s 17 years since Germany won a medal,” Germany coach Gordie Herbert said. “It’s kind of fitting that Dennis Schroder’s number is 17. It’s been an unbelievable honor to coach these guys from Day 1.” Johannes Voigtmann scored 14 for Germany. “We worked hard for it,” Schroder said. “It’s an unbelievable feeling to come out third in the EuroBasket.” Michal Sokolowski led Poland with 18 points, with Jakub Garbacz scoring 12 and A.J. Slaughter finishing with 10 points and 10 assists. Things are about to get very expensive in Golden State. Things already were expensive — the Warriors set an NBA record paying more than $350 million in player salaries and luxury tax last season. This season they will have a bill in the same ballpark. But there are limits to what even Joe Lacob and Peter Guber (the Warriors owners) will spend, even with the cash cow that is the new Chase Center filling their bank accounts. Stephen Curry is about to start a no-brainer $215.4 max contract extension, Klay Thompson is at the max, Andrew Wiggins is in the final year of a max and likely gets extended at a slightly lower but still steep price, and Jordan Poole is up for an extension and while not a max guy is a bridge to the future. All that has led to an interesting bit of speculation: Are the Warriors going to have to break up the band soon? Could Draymond Green be the odd man out? Green is also extension eligible right now, but Warriors GM Bob Myers denied he is out, talking to Tim Kawakami of The Athletic.
Green is set to make $25.8 million this season and is widely expected to opt-out of the $27.6 million player option he has next season. The Warriors can extend him off that deal for four years, $138.4 million ($34.6 million average a year), a big number for a 32-year-old but also short of what Curry and Thompson will make (they are both above $40 million this season). Green is not the offensive player he was six or seven years ago (7.5 points, 7.3 rebounds, and 7 assists a game last season), but that’s never the end of the floor where he made his money — he was the Defensive Player of the Year frontrunner last season until injuries struck. There are many questions: Will the Warriors put that max extension on the table? Would Green take it? Does Green think there could be a bigger contract for him as a free agent next summer? Green brings a very specific skill set to the table as a defender and passer, but it’s not a fit for every system, how many teams would step up with a huge offer for him? The biggest question remains where the Warriors will make cuts? Coming off a title they are wisely bringing the band back together to chase another ring, and they are betting favorites to come out of the West. But with Green, Wiggins, and Poole back in the fold the 2023-24 Warriors could see payroll and taxes jump north of $400 million, a figure even they balk at. Changes have to come from somewhere. It’s something to watch as they sign players to extensions before this season starts, with an eye to the future. Tim Connelly is attempting to get the band back together. Connelly took over as Minnesota’s Team President back in May, and he’s since acquired three former Nuggets in Austin Rivers, Bryn Forbes, and now P.J. Dozier. ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski tweeted on Saturday that Dozier had signed a deal with the Timberwolves.
Dozier is now the 20th player on Minnesota’s roster. With 12 guaranteed contracts already, Dozier likely signed a non-guaranteed or partially guaranteed deal, though the official terms of the contract were not disclosed. While Connelly likely won’t be bringing Nikola Jokic over from Denver, Dozier has still been able to contribute when he’s been healthy throughout his career. Unfortunately, he’s faced more than his fair share of injuries. Dozier was limited to just 18 games last season after tearing his left ACL in November. In those games, he averaged 5.4 points, 3.5 rebounds, and 1.6 assists in 18.9 minutes per game. The season before, he averaged 7.7 points and 3.6 rebounds in 50 appearances, all of which were career-highs. If he’s back to full strength, there’s a chance he makes Minnesota’s final roster and be a nice depth piece for them. However, if he doesn’t make the team, he’ll likely find a home elsewhere and potentially have a better chance to contribute than he would with the Timberwolves. The Portland Trail Blazers should ask for a volume discount on core muscle surgeries. Damian Lillard got one last season and now says he is pain-free for the first time in years and expects a return to his MVP-ballot self. Nassir Little followed suit and had core muscle surgery in May. Now it is just-signed Gary Payton II who just had the same surgery, the Trail Blazers announced on Friday.
The good news for Payton and the Trail Blazers is this is an injury expected to heal fairly quickly and Payton should not miss much, if any, of the season. Payton came to Portland on a three-year, $26.1 million contract after playing a key role in the Warriors’ run to a title. He’s part of a revamped Trail Blazers roster around Lillard, with Jerami Grant and Payton being the two key additions. They are next to a re-signed Anfernee Simon and Jusuf Nurkic. Portland has a solid roster, maybe a playoff team if things go right, but in a very deep West it is one without much margin for error. They need everyone healthy and playing near their peak. That includes Payton, who is now on the road to recovery from core muscle surgery. |
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