Japan NT 2021 Olympics

[Mindozas]

Hosts Japan announced 32 players list for Olympics and some details for preparations. (Google translate edition with some corections of names I knew ) It seems there are at least few naturalized players options with Fazekas being the latest one who played as naturalized in World Cup

2021 Japan Men's Basketball Team 32nd Olympic Games (2020 / Tokyo) Men's Japan National Team Candidates Announced


The Japan Basketball Association (JBA) is a candidate for the Olympic team (32) in the 2021 Japan Men's Basketball Team for the 32nd Olympic Games (Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games) scheduled for this summer on Wednesday, April 14th. We are pleased to inform you that we have announced the name) as follows.


■ 2021 Japan Men's Basketball Team　
32nd Olympic Games (2020 / Tokyo) Men's Japan National Team Candidate Member List

[Players] * 32
Parker Michael (PF / 200cm / Gunma Crane Thunders)
Brown Ira (PF / 195cm / Osaka Evesa)
Atsuya Ota (C / 207cm / Sanen Neo Phoenix)
Kosuke Takeuchi (PF / 207cm / Utsunomiya Brex)
Takeuchi Joji (PF / 207cm / Alvark Tokyo)
Fazekas Nick (C / 211cm / Kawasaki Brave Thunders)
Takatoshi Furukawa (SG / 190cm / Akita Northern Happiness)
Edwards Gavin (PF / 206cm / Chiba Jets)
Ryusei Shinoyama (PG / 178cm / Kawasaki) Brave Thunders)
Kosuke Kanamaru (SG / 192cm / Seahorse Mikawa)
Naoto Tsuji (SG / 185cm / Kawasaki Brave Thunders)
Rossiter Ryan (PF / 206cm / Utsunomiya Brex)
Shin Hiejima (SG / 191cm / Utsunomiya Brex)
Chambers Aki (SF / 190cm / Yokohama Be Corsairs)
Yuya Nagayoshi (PF / 198cm / Kyoto Hannary's)
Daiki Tanaka (SG / 192cm / Alvark Tokyo)
Tenji Harimoto (SF / 198cm / Nagoya Diamond Dolphins)
Seiya Ando (PG / 181cm / Alvark Tokyo) )
Kosuke Hashimoto (SF / 203cm / Tomiyama Grouse)
Yuki Togashi (PG / 167cm / Chiba Jets)
Reio Vendrame (PG / 186cm / Sun Rockers Shibuya)
Shuto Ando (SG / 190cm / Nagoya Diamond Dolphins)
Yuta Watanabe (SF / 206cm) / Toronto Raptors)
Yudai Baba (SF / 198cm / Melbourne United)
Keita Imamura (SF / 191cm / Ryukyu Golden Kings)
Schaefer Yuki Avi (C / 206cm / Seahorse Mikawa)
Rui Hachimura (SF / 203cm / Washington Wizards)
Taichi Nakamura (PG / 190cm / Harashu DB Promi)
Murphy Isaia (SG / 196cm / Hiroshima Dragonfly's)
Toews Kai (PG / 188cm / Utsunomiya Brex)
Hitoshi Watanabe (PF / 207cm / 1st year graduate school at California University Davis)
Yudai Nishida (SG /189cm / Niigata Albirex BB)

* Average 195.4cm, 29.0 years old

[Future plans]
〇 A training camp is scheduled from the end of May ( convening players whose season has ended) 〇 After the B League Championship, a selection camp will be held at the Ajinomoto National Training Center (Kita-ku, Tokyo) from the beginning of June. Start
〇 Several domestic warm-up games are planned from the end of June to just before the Olympics.

[Others]
〇 The members announced this time are "Olympic representative candidates" for the Tokyo 2020 Olympics, and in principle, Olympic representative members will be selected from these 32 members.
〇 "24 Olympic pre-registered athletes" will be announced again in April.

[mojo13]

Hosts Japan announced 32 players list for Olympics and some details for preparations. (Google translate edition with some corections of names I knew ) It seems there are at least few naturalized players options with Fazekas being the latest one who played as naturalized in World Cup

That's allot of European rooted names. Curious if they are all naturalized options and only one ends up on the roster or if others are considered natural-born players. Japan is usually pretty restrictive with citizenship.

Parker Michael (PF / 200cm / Gunma Crane Thunders)
Brown Ira (PF / 195cm / Osaka Evesa)
Fazekas Nick (C / 211cm / Kawasaki Brave Thunders)
Edwards Gavin (PF / 206cm / Chiba Jets)
Rossiter Ryan (PF / 206cm / Utsunomiya Brex)
Chambers Aki (SF / 190cm / Yokohama Be Corsairs)
Reio Vendrame (PG / 186cm / Sun Rockers Shibuya)
Schaefer Yuki Avi (C / 206cm / Seahorse Mikawa)
Murphy Isaia (SG / 196cm / Hiroshima Dragonfly's)
Toews Kai (PG / 188cm / Utsunomiya Brex)

I assume at least some of these are natural born-in-Japan players.

[Mindozas]

That's allot of European rooted names. Curious if they are all naturalized options and only one ends up on the roster or if others are considered natural-born players. Japan is usually pretty restrictive with citizenship.

I don't know about general citizenship situation, you might be right here, but in sports Japan used to naturalize players. Since I'm following football a lot, I remember Japan having naturalized players in 1998, 2002 FIFA World Cups. Talking about East Asia, for example, it's different with China, they were very conservative with naturalization all the time, but lately in football they also naturalized few players after their campaign to raise local stars kept failing. I don't remember naturalized basketball player in their NT, but wouldn't be surprised if that time will come soon enough.

Parker Michael (PF / 200cm / Gunma Crane Thunders)
Brown Ira (PF / 195cm / Osaka Evesa)
Fazekas Nick (C / 211cm / Kawasaki Brave Thunders)
Edwards Gavin (PF / 206cm / Chiba Jets)
Rossiter Ryan (PF / 206cm / Utsunomiya Brex)
Chambers Aki (SF / 190cm / Yokohama Be Corsairs)
Reio Vendrame (PG / 186cm / Sun Rockers Shibuya)
Schaefer Yuki Avi (C / 206cm / Seahorse Mikawa)
Murphy Isaia (SG / 196cm / Hiroshima Dragonfly's)
Toews Kai (PG / 188cm / Utsunomiya Brex)

I assume at least some of these are natural born-in-Japan players.

Yeah, I did some research, so there are few guys born in Japan:

Avi Schaefer is local, born in Japan to Japanese mother and Jewish father. He played for Japan in World Cup along with naturalized Fazekas
Leo (Reio) Vendrame - born in Japan to Japanese mother and Brazilian father. I remember him being one of the last cuts before World Cup 2019
Kai Toews is Japan born, son of Canadian coach BT Toews, who is working in Japan for years, and btw BT's nephew and Kai's cousin is Canadian ice-hockey star Jonathan Toews. Kai played for Japanese youth teams, so shouldn't be counted as naturalized player.
Isaiah Murphy - he played as Shinsaku Enomoto for Japanese u19 in World Cup, combining his middle name and his mother's maiden name. He is born in Japan to Japanese mother and American father. I guess he should be considered as local.

Aki Chambers - US born, to American father and Japanese mother. Not sure when did he receive a passport, if its given by birth if one of the parents is Japanese, then he should be available as local.

Nik Fazekas played for Japan in World Cup as naturalized player.
Ira Brown is naturalized player, I remember him playing for Japan in some Asian tournaments
Michael Parker - naturalized player, plays in Japan for more than 10 years, 39yo, but never heard about him playing for Japan
Ryan Rossiter also US born naturalized player, plays in Japan almost 10 years, played once for Japan recently.
Gavin Edwards is the same case as Rossiter. Both were in camps lately, probably both has the biggest chances to make the team if there'll be no Fazekas.

[Mindozas]

Julio Lamas cut the list to 20 players. Surprise cut was Japanese World Cup star Nick Fazekas. Didn't expect him to be left out this early. Ryan Rossiter and Gavin Edwards remains as naturalized player options, I guess Rossiter has an edge here. The rest of key players are there

[Liha]

Japan invited 3 European teams to have practice matches against them preparing for the Olympics, Belgium, Hungary and Finland. Those games have been played now.

Japan-Hungary 79-58
Japan-Belgium 70-73
Japan-Finland 71-76

So Japan won 1 game and lost 2. In the Japan-Finland game today I can tell you that Japan was missing only 2 players and Finland was using a very experimental team. So it's a very good result for Finland and not a very impressive result by Japan.

Some more results from that tournament if anyone cares:
----
Belgium-Finland 74-64
Hungary-Finland 72-89
Hungary-Belgium ??? Don't know.

[reamily]

Japan invited 3 European teams to have practice matches against them preparing for the Olympics, Belgium, Hungary and Finland. Those games have been played now.

Japan-Hungary 79-58
Japan-Belgium 70-73
Japan-Finland 71-76

So Japan won 1 game and lost 2. In the Japan-Finland game today I can tell you that Japan was missing only 2 players and Finland was using a very experimental team. So it's a very good result for Finland and not a very impressive result by Japan.

Some more results from that tournament if anyone cares:
----
Belgium-Finland 74-64
Hungary-Finland 72-89
Hungary-Belgium ??? Don't know.

Theyre missing their best player Hachimura but still dont know if this can result for them to win against a tough group..

[Liha]

Theyre missing their best player Hachimura but still dont know if this can result for them to win against a tough group..

Even if missing their best player they shouldn't be losing to this Finland which had youngsters and some people who played their first national team games in that tournament in Japan. A player called Jantunen is the closest player of being a starting five player for Finland and has sometimes been in the starting five for Finland. Valtonen is a starting five guy in the future with a lot of potential, but he played just 15 mins in that game. There were a lot of guys playing in that game who wouldn't even make it into Finland's bench roster in real games.

I don't know how much Japan was experimenting if at all. I did read that Japan played zone defense for the entire game and didn't stop doing that any point of the game. I think that Japan loses all their games. Their best chance to pull an upset might be against Argentina. They got Spain, Argentina and Slovenia in their group.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basketball_at_the_2020_Summer_Olympics