ten years later, revisiting team usa’s flop in the 2004 olympics
Basketball was invented in America (by a Canadian, but still) and the U.S. has set and pushed the game’s standard ever since. Thus, there’s a caliber of greatness particularly expected of the United States men’s national team. We’re home to the NBA, the best basketball league in the world and, as such, the United States is expected to assemble a team of players regarded as the world’s elite whenever the occasion for international competition arises.
The Dream Team’s thorough 1992 domination in Barcelona placed the bar at an unrealistic height, as subsequent teams were expected to do more than simply win the gold medal, they were expected to destroy opponents while preserving the U.S.’s sovereign rule over the game. Even as NBA players drop off from this summer’s Team USA in advance of the FIBA World Cup, the expectation is still the same—our C team is still supposed to lay rising powers to waste.
That lofty status was demolished during the 2004 Olympic games in Athens as Team USA sputtered to a bronze medal, suffering humiliating losses in the process. It was an eye-opening moment, as the team was defeated an unfathomable three times—one more loss than they had suffered in all previous Olympic competitions. Previously, the U.S. had only failed to win gold on two other occasions and one was due to seriously suspect officiating; after the other L we started sending NBA players.
The very first game of competition—which happened 10 years ago this week—revealed the 2004 team’s alarming weakness, as Puerto Rico flat-out embarrassed them, 92-73. It was previously implausible that a team featuring just two players with NBA experience could beat a team comprised of NBA All-Stars in such convincing fashion, but it happened. Team USA let Carlos Arroyo run wild like a Puerto Rican Pete Maravich as they fell behind by as many as 22 points.
What remains especially jarring about Team USA’s first loss since NBA players were added to the roster is that it happened right out of the gate.
The victory was arguably Puerto Rico’s greatest moment since Big Pun’s “100%” video, and it left Team USA permanently wounded and figuratively bleeding in the water. Other competitors smelled the blood.
Though they defeated the Greek national team in the following contest, the 77-71 win induced more panic because Team USA was making a legitimate, NBA playoffs-level effort.
“I don’t know what’s worse: not playing as hard as you can and getting beat by nineteen, or playing really hard and beating Greece by six points,” former NBA player and current analyst Tom Tolbert told GQ in 2004.
LeBron James said that, at the time, it was “the loudest arena [he had] ever been in,” and Shawn Marion described the atmosphere as adversarial, noting that “everyone [was] against [them].” Though they survived the hornet’s nest, the narrow margin of victory confirmed that the 2004 team was both ill-prepared and ill-assembled.
“I saw their roster and I knew we would beat them,” Spurs guard and Argentinian national team member Manu Ginobili divulged to GQ. In hindsight, this roster was bound to fail:
What’s troubling is that this should’ve been clear at the time. A team with a lone point guard in Stephon Marbury, a teenage James, and no shooters was destined to falter. The most egregious weakness is the absence of a player who can stretch defenses—a must in international play. When putting this team together, no one thought of Michael Redd? He was a marksman who, in 2004, was coming off an All-Star season. Injuries unfortunately shortened his career, but he played in all 82 games the previous two seasons.
What’s more, FIBA’s 3-point line is closer than the NBA’s; Redd damn near would’ve been shooting free throws. But no, he wasn’t even considered. Furthermore, Richard Hamilton—who had the use of screens down to a science and had just won the NBA championship with the Pistons—was also missing from the squad, because, as Bill Simmons wrote for ESPN’s infamous Page 2, he wasn’t asked until the Finals, i.e. two months before the Olympics started.
What should jump off the page about the 2004 team’s roster is the lack of stars. Both the Dream Team that owned Barcelona and the 1996 team that won the gold in Atlanta sported the best of the best, as their international counterparts always do. The 2004 team screamed “meh,” mostly because the stars passed on the opportunity. USA Today pointed this out following the ass-whooping that Puerto Rico delivered:
Allen Iverson and Tim Duncan were the best (and oldest) players on the team, but they clearly were not enough. LeBron, Dwyane Wade, and Carmelo Anthony were coming off their rookie seasons; none were stars yet. Emeka Okafor was the team’s Christian Laettner, as he had yet to play a game in the NBA.
As Simmons pointed out, Shawn Marion and Richard Jefferson were essentially the same player at that point, and their presence, along with LeBron and Melo’s, created an unnecessary surplus of small forwards. It was like having a healthy supply of cereal and no milk.
It’s hard to fear someone you’ve never heard of, a sentiment former NBA player and coach Paul Silas confirmed. “The problem that I see is that nobody fears this team,” Silas told USA Today. That’s a far cry from the Dream Team experience, when opponents would get slaughtered on-court and then ask to have their photos taken with Charles Barkley or MJ.
By 2004, being on Team USA was something that looked nice on your resume and made for a great story to tell your kids—only it ended up being a nightmare. Their 89-81 loss to Argentina was the nail in the coffin, and coach Larry Brown—the undisputed king of the “cut and run”—looked like he did during the Sixers loss to the Detroit Pistons in the 2003 Eastern Conference semifinals: ready to bounce.
The disaster of the 2004 Olympics (not to mention the sixth place finish in the FIBA Worlds in 2002) was necessary. It was a reminder that Team USA needs to gather their best to represent ‘Merica on a stage that large.
It also apparently prompted players like Kobe Bryant and Jason Kidd to join the team to ensure that this happened.
Former NBA executive Jerry Colangelo, who was hired as the director of USA Basketball in 2005, demanded a three-year commitment from players and rectified the 2004 team’s glaring omission: Michael Redd.
In 2008, the “Redeem Team” won the gold medal in Beijing, restoring USA Basketball to its pedestal, righting past wrongs just as director Bryan Singer recently did to the X-Men movie franchise with X-Men: Days of Future Past. Still, the memory of the 2004 fiasco remains a model for what not to do when building an Olympic team.
http://triangleoffense.com/features/ten-years-later-revisiting-team-usas-flop-in-the-2004-olympics/
Basketball was invented in America (by a Canadian, but still) and the U.S. has set and pushed the game’s standard ever since. Thus, there’s a caliber of greatness particularly expected of the United States men’s national team. We’re home to the NBA, the best basketball league in the world and, as such, the United States is expected to assemble a team of players regarded as the world’s elite whenever the occasion for international competition arises.
The Dream Team’s thorough 1992 domination in Barcelona placed the bar at an unrealistic height, as subsequent teams were expected to do more than simply win the gold medal, they were expected to destroy opponents while preserving the U.S.’s sovereign rule over the game. Even as NBA players drop off from this summer’s Team USA in advance of the FIBA World Cup, the expectation is still the same—our C team is still supposed to lay rising powers to waste.
That lofty status was demolished during the 2004 Olympic games in Athens as Team USA sputtered to a bronze medal, suffering humiliating losses in the process. It was an eye-opening moment, as the team was defeated an unfathomable three times—one more loss than they had suffered in all previous Olympic competitions. Previously, the U.S. had only failed to win gold on two other occasions and one was due to seriously suspect officiating; after the other L we started sending NBA players.
The very first game of competition—which happened 10 years ago this week—revealed the 2004 team’s alarming weakness, as Puerto Rico flat-out embarrassed them, 92-73. It was previously implausible that a team featuring just two players with NBA experience could beat a team comprised of NBA All-Stars in such convincing fashion, but it happened. Team USA let Carlos Arroyo run wild like a Puerto Rican Pete Maravich as they fell behind by as many as 22 points.
What remains especially jarring about Team USA’s first loss since NBA players were added to the roster is that it happened right out of the gate.
The victory was arguably Puerto Rico’s greatest moment since Big Pun’s “100%” video, and it left Team USA permanently wounded and figuratively bleeding in the water. Other competitors smelled the blood.
Though they defeated the Greek national team in the following contest, the 77-71 win induced more panic because Team USA was making a legitimate, NBA playoffs-level effort.
“I don’t know what’s worse: not playing as hard as you can and getting beat by nineteen, or playing really hard and beating Greece by six points,” former NBA player and current analyst Tom Tolbert told GQ in 2004.
LeBron James said that, at the time, it was “the loudest arena [he had] ever been in,” and Shawn Marion described the atmosphere as adversarial, noting that “everyone [was] against [them].” Though they survived the hornet’s nest, the narrow margin of victory confirmed that the 2004 team was both ill-prepared and ill-assembled.
“I saw their roster and I knew we would beat them,” Spurs guard and Argentinian national team member Manu Ginobili divulged to GQ. In hindsight, this roster was bound to fail:
What’s troubling is that this should’ve been clear at the time. A team with a lone point guard in Stephon Marbury, a teenage James, and no shooters was destined to falter. The most egregious weakness is the absence of a player who can stretch defenses—a must in international play. When putting this team together, no one thought of Michael Redd? He was a marksman who, in 2004, was coming off an All-Star season. Injuries unfortunately shortened his career, but he played in all 82 games the previous two seasons.
What’s more, FIBA’s 3-point line is closer than the NBA’s; Redd damn near would’ve been shooting free throws. But no, he wasn’t even considered. Furthermore, Richard Hamilton—who had the use of screens down to a science and had just won the NBA championship with the Pistons—was also missing from the squad, because, as Bill Simmons wrote for ESPN’s infamous Page 2, he wasn’t asked until the Finals, i.e. two months before the Olympics started.
What should jump off the page about the 2004 team’s roster is the lack of stars. Both the Dream Team that owned Barcelona and the 1996 team that won the gold in Atlanta sported the best of the best, as their international counterparts always do. The 2004 team screamed “meh,” mostly because the stars passed on the opportunity. USA Today pointed this out following the ass-whooping that Puerto Rico delivered:
Shaquille O’Neal, Jermaine O’Neal and Ben Wallace all cited fatigue; Kevin Garnett, Vince Carter and Ray Allen are getting married; Kobe Bryant’s trial for sexual assault is slated to begin this month; Jason Kidd, Karl Malone and Elton Brand are injured; and Mike Bibby and Tracy McGrady cited security concerns.
Allen Iverson and Tim Duncan were the best (and oldest) players on the team, but they clearly were not enough. LeBron, Dwyane Wade, and Carmelo Anthony were coming off their rookie seasons; none were stars yet. Emeka Okafor was the team’s Christian Laettner, as he had yet to play a game in the NBA.
As Simmons pointed out, Shawn Marion and Richard Jefferson were essentially the same player at that point, and their presence, along with LeBron and Melo’s, created an unnecessary surplus of small forwards. It was like having a healthy supply of cereal and no milk.
On top of that, the 2004 team was far from intimidating. Argentina’s Juan “Pepe” Sanchez candidly told GQ that he actually had to explain to his teammates who some of Team USA’s players were.
It’s hard to fear someone you’ve never heard of, a sentiment former NBA player and coach Paul Silas confirmed. “The problem that I see is that nobody fears this team,” Silas told USA Today. That’s a far cry from the Dream Team experience, when opponents would get slaughtered on-court and then ask to have their photos taken with Charles Barkley or MJ.
Stu Jackson (who, as journalist Peter Vecsey reminded GQ, “failed with the Knicks, Wisconsin, [and] Vancouver”), David Stern, and others threw together the best team they could at the last minute. The obvious problem is that an (almost) All-Star team pieced together at the 25th hour like some sort of jigsaw puzzle has no shot of defeating teams who play together annually and already have cohesion. The international teams live for that shit. “You can’t just walk up and put a team together in two weeks and beat a team that’s been playing together for years,” Sam Mitchell told USA Today.
By 2004, being on Team USA was something that looked nice on your resume and made for a great story to tell your kids—only it ended up being a nightmare. Their 89-81 loss to Argentina was the nail in the coffin, and coach Larry Brown—the undisputed king of the “cut and run”—looked like he did during the Sixers loss to the Detroit Pistons in the 2003 Eastern Conference semifinals: ready to bounce.
The disaster of the 2004 Olympics (not to mention the sixth place finish in the FIBA Worlds in 2002) was necessary. It was a reminder that Team USA needs to gather their best to represent ‘Merica on a stage that large.
The shame of 2004’s bronze finish compelled players like James, Anthony, Wade and Carlos Boozer to return four years later to try and erase the haunting memory.
It also apparently prompted players like Kobe Bryant and Jason Kidd to join the team to ensure that this happened.
Former NBA executive Jerry Colangelo, who was hired as the director of USA Basketball in 2005, demanded a three-year commitment from players and rectified the 2004 team’s glaring omission: Michael Redd.
In 2008, the “Redeem Team” won the gold medal in Beijing, restoring USA Basketball to its pedestal, righting past wrongs just as director Bryan Singer recently did to the X-Men movie franchise with X-Men: Days of Future Past. Still, the memory of the 2004 fiasco remains a model for what not to do when building an Olympic team.
http://triangleoffense.com/features/ten-years-later-revisiting-team-usas-flop-in-the-2004-olympics/
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