The Basketball Presidency
Yesterday, I argued that the new basketball-centric administration was well-positioned to forge a close alliance with Spain, home of the world’s second-best pro league. It was pointed out to me that this is imprecise — the Euroleague, which is basically European basketball’s version of a “champion’s league” taking the best teams from different national leagues, is the second-best league in the world after the NBA. But that’s only if you count it. I would consider Euroleague more like a tournament than a league as such. And in terms of national basketball leagues, my understanding is that after the NBA, Spain is tops closely followed by Italy and then Russia.
What I hadn’t realized, however, is that Spanish Prime Minister José Luis Zapatero likes to play basketball, though based on that article he doesn’t quite seem to have Obama’s skills.
28 Responses to “The Basketball Presidency”
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December 3rd, 2008 at 10:51 am
Absolutely. If you’re talking about the best football (soccer) league, you argue between the Premiership, La Liga, or Serie A. You’d never think of saying: “hey the Champions League is better than all of them!” The only difference seems to be that they call the prelim qualifier a “regular season” and there are (will be?) teams that permanently qualify.
I checked the page, and find it kind of funny that last year’s MVP for the euroleague final was Trajan Langdon.
December 3rd, 2008 at 11:21 am
Proof of the proposition that the UEFA Champions League (as well as the CONCACAF, AFC, and CAF Champions League and Copa Sudamericana) is not a “league” in the same sense as a domestic league: in domestic leagues, each team will play every other team at least twice, once at home and once away, whereas in the champions league this simply never happens.
December 3rd, 2008 at 11:28 am
What are you taking about lumberjack, teams play each other in Champions league twice *all the time*. First, during the 3 qualifying rounds, they’re home-and-away series. During the group stage, which is what we’re currently at, teams play each other twice, once home and once away. Finally, the 16 teams that advance from the group stage are entered in a single elimination tournament using – guess what! – home-and-away series.
In fact, the only time there is no return game is for the Champions League final, which is a single game at a pre-determined venue. I believe it’s Rome this year.
December 3rd, 2008 at 11:30 am
Given that the sum total of my Spain knowlege is limited to their sports it seems like the #2 Spanish pastime is “being openly racist” so we’ll see how that goes.
They also have El Bulli, I guess, but molexular gastronomy does not improve my opinion of anyone
December 3rd, 2008 at 11:36 am
My President-Elect can score from downtown, how ’bout yours?
December 3rd, 2008 at 11:41 am
Just think, if McCain had been elected we’d practically be at war with Spain right now, but instead we’re talking about the President inviting Zapatero over to shoot hoops. Elections have consequences. Wonderful, sane, rational happy consequences.
December 3rd, 2008 at 11:52 am
Andy:
What Lumberjack means is that in the domestic leagues, every team in the league plays every other team in the league home and away every season. This year, Dynamo Kyiv will not play Manchester United at all, because they are being knocked out of the competition.
December 3rd, 2008 at 12:32 pm
Andy: Read cube.
Thank you cube.
December 3rd, 2008 at 1:21 pm
Dude you were right. The Euroleague is not a league, each of those teams in the Euroleague play in their own league and join the Euroleague for a kind of tournmanent of champions. This is similar, not analgous but similar, to college conferences coming together for the NCAA tourney.
If the Field of 64 is a conference then the person who corrected you is right. Btw, my brother plays in the ACB this is how I know.
k1
December 3rd, 2008 at 1:33 pm
Re “Given that the sum total of my Spain knowlege is limited to their sports it seems like the #2 Spanish pastime is “being openly racist” so we’ll see how that goes.”
The sum total of your knowledge of Spain is basically zilch, and it would appear that your #1 oastime is being openly a dolt, Jack.
By the way, Matthew – the article you quote in no way gives any information on Zapatero’s skill level. It would only indicates that he gets injured playing ball more easily than Obama does. That said – yes, Barack Obama is a better player than Zapatero.
December 3rd, 2008 at 2:19 pm
Al, other sports have different league structures. Football (soccer) leagues uniformly have the characteristic of each team playing every other team at least twice, home and away. One of the few domestic leagues that has conferences is Major League Soccer in the states, in which the teams in each conference play one another for an additional, third game.
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