It may frustrate the you-know-what out of Mark Cuban, but most of the players who compete in the Olympics take a great deal of pride in it and enjoy the experience. Of the 12 players on the current Team USA roster, only two are 23 years old or younger. That means if David Stern and many NBA owners had their way, the 2012 team would look totally different.
As you have probably heard, Stern has expressed a desire to make Olympic rosters strictly limited to players who are 23 and under or start an entirely separate World Cup of basketball and have that be the format. Tyson Chandler thinks it is a horrible idea.
“The players definitely have power, because we’re the ones out there playing,” Chandler told Yahoo! Sports on Saturday. “If the players chose not to play because they’ve taken something away from us, then obviously we control it.
“Anyone who has anything to do with it needs to step up and speak about it, because I think it’s absolutely ridiculous. That means one player would be able to come back and play for the Olympics on the squad.”
Chandler is not the first prominent NBA player to take that stance and he likely won’t be the last. Owners like Cuban want to protect their investments, but a number of players look forward to Olympic play and feel that it is a great way to prepare for the upcoming NBA season. Whether or not the players or owners get their way in the near future remains to be seen.
H/T I Am a GM
