The upcomimg merger between oceania and asia, FIBA is destroying bball

[locdogjr]

And then what, do a QUADRUPLE ROUND ROBIN for every single basketball NT in the world in an NBA-style home-and-away format?

That's insane, man.

lol

Well, my main concern is that if FIBA wants to have qualifying during the NBA season, no NBA players will be able to participate.

With no NBA, NCAA, or possibly even Euroleague players, how is this new qualifying format going to work? Maybe Philippines, Taiwan, Korea, Angola, etc can shut down their nationally leagues to do it, but the best players for the most part will not be allowed to participate. How will this new qualifying work if that is the case?

[eshmawi]

Let me get this right, there are 7 spots to qualify to world cup from Asia????
lol. This is good for us, i think... But not good for others, because reality is Asia is the weakest basketball region.Every world cup, our teams finish dead last.

If Australia, New Zealand join... its still 5 spot...

[judasmartel]

lol

Well, my main concern is that if FIBA wants to have qualifying during the NBA season, no NBA players will be able to participate.

With no NBA, NCAA, or possibly even Euroleague players, how is this new qualifying format going to work? Maybe Philippines, Taiwan, Korea, Angola, etc can shut down their nationally leagues to do it, but the best players for the most part will not be allowed to participate. How will this new qualifying work if that is the case?

Not happening in our case. Our national league is like 10 months long, and the new FIBA schedule smacks right into the middle of the season.

I don't get why FIBA has to make FIVE separate qualifying windows spanning 18 months, when the entire EuroBasket qualification tournament only takes ONE time window spanning like 1-3 months iirc, and that's a lot of home and away games compared to the current qualifiers with only one host nation.

[judasmartel]

Let me get this right, there are 7 spots to qualify to world cup from Asia????
lol. This is good for us, i think... But not good for others, because reality is Asia is the weakest basketball region.Every world cup, our teams finish dead last.

If Australia, New Zealand join... its still 5 spot...

Yes, still 5 Asian spots with OZ and NZ joining us. Still good for Asia, it will up the level of competition, though it doesn't look apparent at first.

[locdogjr]

Not happening in our case. Our national league is like 10 months long, and the new FIBA schedule smacks right into the middle of the season.

I don't get why FIBA has to make FIVE separate qualifying windows spanning 18 months, when the entire EuroBasket qualification tournament only takes ONE time window spanning like 1-3 months iirc, and that's a lot of home and away games compared to the current qualifiers with only one host nation.

I love the theory of it. Such as in soccer, we would get to see meaningful national basketball year round. Every 3 months you'd get a Gilas game someplace in the Philippines, this increasing every national teams' visibility in their home country. The Jones cup in Taiwan is great for a week, but if FIBA could have 5 more games throughout the year here then it keeps FIBA on our minds as opposed to an every 2 years for 2 weeks in the summer thing.

[judasmartel]

I love the theory of it. Such as in soccer, we would get to see meaningful national basketball year round. Every 3 months you'd get a Gilas game someplace in the Philippines, this increasing every national teams' visibility in their home country. The Jones cup in Taiwan is great for a week, but if FIBA could have 5 more games throughout the year here then it keeps FIBA on our minds as opposed to an every 2 years for 2 weeks in the summer thing.

At least we have something else to watch back home other than the NBA and the PBA all year round.

I love the theory, too, but I just don't know how the NBA players could suit up for their home nations during the WC qualifiers that way, considering the qualifiers is now the first step for Olympic qualification, and NBA players WANT to play in the Olympics.

[locdogjr]

At least we have something else to watch back home other than the NBA and the PBA all year round.

I love the theory, too, but I just don't know how the NBA players could suit up for their home nations during the WC qualifiers that way, considering the qualifiers is now the first step for Olympic qualification, and NBA players WANT to play in the Olympics.

Exactly. I have heard very little discussion of how this is actually going to work. FIBA actually hired a FIFA dude to takeover and implement this system when they were thinking about it, so he just copied the FIFA model essentially. By the time the 2019 qualifiers come around, we shall see what happens. We can all enjoy the current system until 2016 and hope there is a plan in place to make this actually work.

[mojo13]

Bottom line,
something had to be done about the nonsense that was FIBA Oceania. For the longest time only two teams have regularly participated.

Very much in agreement with this comment. FIBA Oceania has been a joke for a very long time.


The new format does hurt the teams with the most NBA players as you can be very sure they won't be released in mid-season to play for their national teams. Countries with good depth and domestic leagues that they can bully into releasing players will have an advantage. National teams with strong coaching and systems in place will be at an advantage as well. It is going to be tough for countries to try to drag guys from all over the world to come home mid-season for training and a game or two. Was the current system so bad? I know it is not perfect, but summer tournaments when the main leagues are offseason seems to be doing ok.

I am truly disappointed as a Canadian to see this format change just when we have a large crop of young NBA players. They will do us little good now - fortunately we have some growing depth too and maybe the players in Europe will be released to play. Perhaps the low level NBA players / borderline d-leaguers will be released to play as well?

[judasmartel]

Very much in agreement with this comment. FIBA Oceania has been a joke for a very long time.


The new format does hurt the teams with the most NBA players as you can be very sure they won't be released in mid-season to play for their national teams. Countries with good depth and domestic leagues that they can bully into releasing players will have an advantage. National teams with strong coaching and systems in place will be at an advantage as well. It is going to be tough for countries to try to drag guys from all over the world to come home mid-season for training and a game or two. Was the current system so bad? I know it is not perfect, but summer tournaments when the main leagues are offseason seems to be doing ok.

I am truly disappointed as a Canadian to see this format change just when we have a large crop of young NBA players. They will do us little good now - fortunately we have some growing depth too and maybe the players in Europe will be released to play. Perhaps the low level NBA players / borderline d-leaguers will be released to play as well?

FIBA probably wants basketball all year round, not just every summer or so.

But then again, FIBA will never be like FIFA, even if they try to be like FIFA.

[Mindozas]

FIBA probably wants basketball all year round, not just every summer or so.

But then again, FIBA will never be like FIFA, even if they try to be like FIFA.

All they wanted was to make World Cup as prestigious as possible. For that they made it Olympic qualifiers as they realises that they can't compete with Olympics itself and secondary quite drastically downgraded the prestige of continental championships

[judasmartel]

All they wanted was to make World Cup as prestigious as possible. For that they made it Olympic qualifiers as they realises that they can't compete with Olympics itself and secondary quite drastically downgraded the prestige of continental championships

If anything, since the continental championships right after the Olympic years is now non-bearing, it at least has some use for development of young players, at least in the Asia Pacific anyway.

[Mindozas]

If anything, since the continental championships right after the Olympic years is now non-bearing, it at least has some use for development of young players, at least in the Asia Pacific anyway.

In Europe or Americas interest in post-Olympics tournaments decreased heavily in last decade, basically with salaries goin' up so drastically, more and more players started simply to skip those, cause wanted to save themselves for clubs and play for NT only when it matters the most. The same fate happened to World Cup. As I remember, 2002 probably was the last tournament that brought all the stars, in 2006 even if it still was really good, but there were first worrisome signs that players preffer to rest, and save themeselfes for more important 2007 as Olympic qualifier. Lithuania was good example of that with atleast few of our star player missing. Now the situation in even worse. In 2013 there were so many missings that it was hard to count, probably some 30 players, who could make some noise missed it, including some big stars like Dirk, Pau, Kirilenko. Now I don't know what's gonna happen. There'll be two places to OQT, but how much players will care for that, when you will quite easily grab it via World Cup, atleast for European sides. Afterall 16 teams from there will make it...

[judasmartel]

In Europe or Americas interest in post-Olympics tournaments decreased heavily in last decade, basically with salaries goin' up so drastically, more and more players started simply to skip those, cause wanted to save themselves for clubs and play for NT only when it matters the most. The same fate happened to World Cup. As I remember, 2002 probably was the last tournament that brought all the stars, in 2006 even if it still was really good, but there were first worrisome signs that players preffer to rest, and save themeselfes for more important 2007 as Olympic qualifier. Lithuania was good example of that with atleast few of our star player missing. Now the situation in even worse. In 2013 there were so many missings that it was hard to count, probably some 30 players, who could make some noise missed it, including some big stars like Dirk, Pau, Kirilenko. Now I don't know what's gonna happen. There'll be two places to OQT, but how much players will care for that, when you will quite easily grab it via World Cup, atleast for European sides. Afterall 16 teams from there will make it...

That's why I said the now non-bearing continental championships after Olympic years might have some use for developing young players. Doesn't matter if the stars are not there, but since EC is EC and AC is AC, well, yeah. Continental championships are now pretty useless otherwise anyway.

[Modis]

Bottom line,
something had to be done about the nonsense that was FIBA Oceania. For the longest time only two teams have regularly participated.

Australia wins every year this oceania tournament. Literally every year .

[Steadysoul]

Australia wins every year this oceania tournament. Literally every year .

Even when it doesn't matter who wins. Literally win or lose both qualify for the World Cup.