Devin Booker, Khris Middleton and Jrue Holiday are expected to be available to play in Team USA’s Sunday morning opener, Brian Windhorst of ESPN writes. The Bucks duo joined Booker in Seattle on Friday to take a private plane to Tokyo. The Finals trio won’t get a chance to practice with the team but coach Gregg Popovich would like to play them right away against France.
We have more Olympic-related news and tidbits:
- JaVale McGee is a much different player than the man he replaced, Kevin Love, on Team USA. That forces Popovich to alter his frontcourt strategy and McGee may be nothing more than an insurance policy against France, Joe Vardon of The Athletic writes.
- Heat wing Duncan Robinson claimed on The Long Shot Podcast that he nearly replaced Bradley Beal on Team USA’s roster, as Anthony Chiang of the Miami Herald relays. “It basically got to the point where like it started to pick up some momentum and it looked like it was going to happen,” Robinson said. Keldon Johnson was eventually chosen as Beal’s replacement.
- Many of the other teams in the Olympics could threaten Team USA in its quest for gold and Vardon takes a closer look at the other 11 squads and their chances of knocking off the American contingent.
- Luka Doncic, Kevin Durant and Damian Lillard head HoopsHype’s Frank Urbina’s Olympic player rankings. Doncic edged out Durant due to the fact he’ll likely put up big numbers for Slovenia. Urbina lists his top 30 players in Tokyo.
I’m not against patriotism but this is NOT the Olympics Id want my home teams players playing in , especially these 3 who NEED the rest …
I almost rather they sent the college players for just this year. Lets just hope nobody gets hurt
They’ll be alright. Remember they volunteered. They wanna be out there, these guys love playing basketball especially on the biggest stage in the world. Also remember that NBA guys going to the Olympics is a huge reason we have people like Giannis, Embiid, Jokic, Luka, Siakam & more in the league now. The game is growing in incredible ways worldwide bc of tournaments like this & the best in the world playing on a global stage. This tournament being as great as it’s probably gonna end up being is great for the game
1 of the most interesting, high level, intriguing, absolute best basketball tournaments of all time was the 2004 Olympic Tournament. This is an even more talented, more potentially intriguing tournament than that 1. I’m so interested to see what the 3 Bucks (Nwora- Nigeria, Middleton/Holiday- usa) do. Nwora looks like he might play a complementary role for Nigeria bc he hasn’t been with the team at all since they been together practicing, but he is arguably their best player fr & could be a big reason they end up on the medal stand in a few weeks. Middleton is a guy who didn’t play up to his capabilities a couple yrs ago at the World Cup. Obv he’s riding high off a fresh NBA title & a great postseason run but he’s gonna be needed for team usa just like he was needed in 2019 in China
Unless the U.S. goes small ball (like the Clippers), Javale will be needed to push Rudy around.
Booker, Middleton, and Holiday will probably need load management if they are going to have any gas in the tank come the ’22 playoffs.
After the myriad of injuries in the NBA last season I think a lot of teams will employ load management with their aging star players. So what if fans hate it, it’s here to stay.
Its a good point Wally, perhaps the fans need to take “their first” L ever here on LM moving forward
While LeBrons resistance to sitting had shades of toughness and “old school” it was pretty foolish in hindsight to everyone really, himself inc
This had way too much to do with the media portraying Klaw as the King and the one they call King acting like a 12 yr old to prove them all wrong. Hopefully the lesson has been learned
Yea I expect down years for those guys next year.
“gallinari is the best Italian player ever”
Please, he doesn’t. Please stop bullshitting. He is the best Italian player in NBA.
Sooo very true Maz… I mean pretend that Gallinari is better than say Dino Meneghin or Antonello Riva is just plain ignorant!!!
The boys will be fun to watch. Hopefully I’ll keep my eye on some of my favorite stars. Let’s go, USA!
That’s a long flight for the Bucks duo to tease to Booker how much Phoenix choked after being up 2-0.