Panathinaikos 2018-19

[saras]

calathes' agent talked in the radio yesterday. there is mutual desire to renew the contract and some talks have been made. nba is not his priority right now and only panathinaikos leaving the euroleague might change his mind about europe and staying to panathinaikos (like i said,i think he will renew with a contract between 2.5-3M/year for 3 years.)

mike james hasnt agreed with armani. if armani has agreed with nedovic and della vale already,then its impossible that they will go for james too. if barcelona really go after pangos (1.5M/year is crazy if its real) then another contender is out. i dont think real would go for a guy like james to replace doncic,so one more out. he has already said by himself that he would not go at maccabi,efes and fener. csska has guards,khimki has guards,olympiakos cant afford and he would not go there,so i think we have the same situation like last year. its either panathinaikos or going back to the nba which is not quite possible. so with a contract 1.3-1.5M/ year he can stay as well and build the team around these 2,who fit really well like they showed during james' comeback

there are rumours abour ulanovas as well. i prefer somebody else in that spot,papapetrou for example cause he will save us one spot for a foreign player

DPG wrote on payne's instagram that he should start preparing for the next year cause they will give him a full contract. i believe in payne and with proper summer training and understanding of european basketball he could be a beast in europe. he is not athletic but he is physically strong. he was the only one during the series with real that could block out and push guys like tavares and ayon


the ideal roster for me (with 6 foreigners+1 maybe one for euroleague. gist was rumoured to be trying to get a greek passport since last summer,but still no sign of doing so) would be

calathes,james,pappas,denmon,gkikas or koniaris for 5th guard and mainly greek league
rivers,antetokunbo,papapetrou
justin hamilton,mitoglou,gist,payne,pleiss

budget 11-11.5 M for players. every year we start with around 10M and in the mid season we bring players with a lot of money like elliot willilams,gentile,james etc. so having a full roster from the start would be the ideal

[Gudura]

calathes' agent talked in the radio yesterday. there is mutual desire to renew the contract and some talks have been made. nba is not his priority right now and only panathinaikos leaving the euroleague might change his mind about europe and staying to panathinaikos (like i said,i think he will renew with a contract between 2.5-3M/year for 3 years.)

mike james hasnt agreed with armani. if armani has agreed with nedovic and della vale already,then its impossible that they will go for james too. if barcelona really go after pangos (1.5M/year is crazy if its real) then another contender is out. i dont think real would go for a guy like james to replace doncic,so one more out. he has already said by himself that he would not go at maccabi,efes and fener. csska has guards,khimki has guards,olympiakos cant afford and he would not go there,so i think we have the same situation like last year. its either panathinaikos or going back to the nba which is not quite possible. so with a contract 1.3-1.5M/ year he can stay as well and build the team around these 2,who fit really well like they showed during james' comeback

there are rumours abour ulanovas as well. i prefer somebody else in that spot,papapetrou for example cause he will save us one spot for a foreign player

DPG wrote on payne's instagram that he should start preparing for the next year cause they will give him a full contract. i believe in payne and with proper summer training and understanding of european basketball he could be a beast in europe. he is not athletic but he is physically strong. he was the only one during the series with real that could block out and push guys like tavares and ayon


the ideal roster for me (with 6 foreigners+1 maybe one for euroleague. gist was rumoured to be trying to get a greek passport since last summer,but still no sign of doing so) would be

calathes,james,pappas,denmon,gkikas or koniaris for 5th guard and mainly greek league
rivers,antetokunbo,papapetrou
justin hamilton,mitoglou,gist,payne,pleiss

budget 11-11.5 M for players. every year we start with around 10M and in the mid season we bring players with a lot of money like elliot willilams,gentile,james etc. so having a full roster from the start would be the ideal

...and that will be one more season without F4 for you...I really don't understand how some people can't realise that James is a cancer wound of any serious F4 contender

[saras]

...and that will be one more season without F4 for you...I really don't understand how some people can't realise that James is a cancer wound of any serious F4 contender

basketball is becoming more and more 1v1 reliable. even obradovic got to the point to allow bobby dixon do his thing,otherwise he would be out of the final in the match against zalgiris. and james is definetely one of the best in that kind of basketball.

btw the era of mobile centers is coming to an end. vesely is athletic but not the typical mobile center. ayon,tavares are far from called athletic,milutinov is the same etc. so i think payne that combines athletism and height is a good choice to match guys like vesely. centers like hunter,hines become less usefull as time passes and will go back in the rotation from year to year

[ZalgirisFanForLife]

Are there any rumors about Lekavicius leaving PAO?

[janketa]

...and that will be one more season without F4 for you...I really don't understand how some people can't realise that James is a cancer wound of any serious F4 contender

Maybe he is cancer for F4 contenders but for teams that are title contenders he is what is needed in big games. If you watched F4 in Belgrade(I am sure you did) then you could notice that Fener and Zalgiris lacks of that kind of player, the real shooting guard who can penetrate and score. He could be step ahead for Fener. I don't know about other teams.

[saras]

Are there any rumors about Lekavicius leaving PAO?

If they have talked with ulanovas for real during the f4 we can trade them. All yours, we might get a taller pass first guard in his plave. He is good next to calathes as a sg though, but he is a big problem at defense

[Demetrios I. Soter]

Some Pana individual player stats before the season starts:

Nick Calathes at Fiba Qualification against Israel, Serbia and Georgia averaged 19Pts. 6,7As, 3,7Reb and the new trend for him seems to be 52,3% 3pts 10/19 :-)
Thanasis Antetkounmpo 5 Games pretty good 8,8Pts. 1,8Blk. and just 1 TO in 5 games
Konstantinos Mitoglou pretty good 8Pts. 4Reb. 1,2As, maybe 1. PF Position ??
Ioannis Papapetrou vs Serbia and Gergia 7,5Pts., 2,5Reb
Unfortunately, Papagiannis was a disappointing even against Georgia when Bourousis did not play he had no impact.

Keith Langfort in friendly games 20Pts. vs Maccabi, 16Pts. vs Khimki, 17Pts. vs AEK it looks like Pana has made a bargain for the upcoming season with him, not even close to Bobby Brown Oly Comparison from last season, he is in good shape.
Also Lojeski played very good. Hopefully he stays healthy then he can be a factor.
I do not like Gist as a center and I have doubts about Thomas and Lasme can play on high Level. Pappas as always ???

[Nemanja]

Panathinaikos is hopeless.Back Lasme 36 age,buying Langford 36 age,Thomas backup player .And core of play will be Calathes and who else,Gist maybe ,32 age,Lojeski 33 age,or Pappagianis,or Antetokounmpo.Absurdly is how much Panathinaikos is disoriented .Quarter finals is optimum like previous seasons .

[Nemanja]

I unsay what I wrote ,and apologized on other topic to supporters Panathinaikos ,I think Panathinaikos is best since Obradovic departure,and at finally have chance for f4 .

[ByThor]

the current pao players do not fit pitino's coaching style. he likes pressure defense to produce turnovers and an up tempo, ball movement offense. the current pao players would need oxygen masks after the 1st quarter and be fully gassed by the middle of the of the 3rd if he keeps that style. I don't know if he can coach a team that dribbles for 15-20 seconds and tries to create a shot with 1, maybe 2 passes in the last 2-3 seconds of the shot clock.

[Phantim3dx]

Evening all from lovely Seattle;

I've come out of my long hibernation and posting on these boards. Obviously, what's caught my eye is the "under the radar" (at least stateside here) of Coach Pitino, being hired as Pana's coach, in the middle of the season no less.

I'm curious as to the pros/cons/anything really, of what you guys, the media, the fans, think about this and what it means for Pana, its players. I saw the first game and read somewhere Pitino laid into his players because they were doing sloppy in practice. do fans in eurpe like him or how he fits into the system?

would love anyones thoughts both pana fans as well as other fans. were you guys surprised they beat cska?

much thanks!

[Oly_fan]

Evening all from lovely Seattle;

I've come out of my long hibernation and posting on these boards. Obviously, what's caught my eye is the "under the radar" (at least stateside here) of Coach Pitino, being hired as Pana's coach, in the middle of the season no less.

I'm curious as to the pros/cons/anything really, of what you guys, the media, the fans, think about this and what it means for Pana, its players. I saw the first game and read somewhere Pitino laid into his players because they were doing sloppy in practice. do fans in eurpe like him or how he fits into the system?

would love anyones thoughts both pana fans as well as other fans. were you guys surprised they beat cska?

much thanks!

Winning the cska game was imo a mix of new-coach-confidence and cska being much weaker this season especially away and not having the players to take advantage of pao's weakness in the paint.
Pao was then blown out by Oly in the next game and all the problems they had are still there.

Regarding Pitino himself, at this point he really hasn't had either the time or the personnel to even try to change things. I'll have to say that he puts out a very respectful, somber image so I realize why all those scandals around him had such an impact.

[Phantim3dx]

Winning the cska game was imo a mix of new-coach-confidence and cska being much weaker this season especially away and not having the players to take advantage of pao's weakness in the paint.
Pao was then blown out by Oly in the next game and all the problems they had are still there.

Regarding Pitino himself, at this point he really hasn't had either the time or the personnel to even try to change things. I'll have to say that he puts out a very respectful, somber image so I realize why all those scandals around him had such an impact.

OLY FAN, much thanks for the input.

Since I'm a casual euroleague fan at best, what were/are the weaknesses of Pana this season (perhaps in past) in the paint? I know Pitino (referring to his time stateside career) likes to implement an aggressive defense press. It needs physical athletes with stamina, and from the looks of the oly vs pana game, it looked like Pana was gassed/tired halfway through. Am I wrong in this observation?

[Oly_fan]

OLY FAN, much thanks for the input.

Since I'm a casual euroleague fan at best, what were/are the weaknesses of Pana this season (perhaps in past) in the paint? I know Pitino (referring to his time stateside career) likes to implement an aggressive defense press. It needs physical athletes with stamina, and from the looks of the oly vs pana game, it looked like Pana was gassed/tired halfway through. Am I wrong in this observation?

They were out of the game as soon as it began, even if on paper they managed to stay close for 10-15 minutes.
Their greatest problem is in making Gist (who used to be considered an athletic power forward) a full-time center. Now his athleticism has declined and he hasn't gained any strength so rebounding comes hard. Same deal with re-signing and giving minutes at center to a 36-year-old Lasme.

Maybe they honestly thought that Papagiannis would be able to contribute actual minutes but his conditioning is still bad (it was terrible earlier in the season), his fundamentals are for the most part absent and even on his best day and shape he's still a defensive liability, just of a different kind.

[EverGreen]

Evening all from lovely Seattle;

I've come out of my long hibernation and posting on these boards. Obviously, what's caught my eye is the "under the radar" (at least stateside here) of Coach Pitino, being hired as Pana's coach, in the middle of the season no less.

I'm curious as to the pros/cons/anything really, of what you guys, the media, the fans, think about this and what it means for Pana, its players. I saw the first game and read somewhere Pitino laid into his players because they were doing sloppy in practice. do fans in eurpe like him or how he fits into the system?

would love anyones thoughts both pana fans as well as other fans. were you guys surprised they beat cska?

much thanks!

Although the odds were against us vs CSKA it wasnt a suprise we won because we can beat anyone at home.

Coach Pitino is revered and we PAO fans feel honored he's with us. We're sure he'll improve our local young players.

In regards to players from Day 1 he requested a tallish guard that can play both pg and sg.

Against Oly all our problems came out. It's too soon for him to leave his mark but were a definitely trying to be more aggressive on the ball in def.